More apheresis medicine abstracts should be published into manuscripts for clinical use

Frequency of Alterations in Apheresis‐Related Abstracts Prior to Publications as Peer‐Reviewed Articles

“…Evidence to support clinical guidelines in apheresis is scarce, and our previous studies have shown that publication rates of potentially useful evidence over the last 8 years is very low compared to other medical fields . In this current study, we suggest that one should not change practice based on abstract presentations at Annual Meetings, as these abstracts' results are not final despite being a valuable part of the process leading to manuscript publication.…”

“…Regardless of these limitations, the rate of publication of apheresis-related abstracts into peer-reviewed articles in PubMedindexed journals in English language is very low, and only a minority of them contain alterations that were potentially enough to change clinical practice. Evidence to support clinical guidelines in apheresis is scarce, and our previous studies have shown that publication rates of potentially useful evidence over the last 8 years is very low compared to other medical fields (7)(8)(9). In this current study, we suggest that one should not change practice based on abstract presentations at Annual Meetings, as these abstracts' results are not final despite being a valuable part of the process leading to manuscript publication.…”

“…The search methodology and review of all apheresis‐related abstracts accepted to both AABB and ASFA Annual Meetings and their corresponding published peer‐reviewed abstracts in PubMed (if they exist) through September 2014 during an 8‐year period from 2005 to 2012 have been described in detail previously . Briefly, a PubMed search using the authors' names and meeting abstract title was conducted to determine if the work was published in a PubMed‐indexed journal in English.…”

“…We recently determined that the publication rate for apheresis‐related abstracts presented at both AABB and ASFA Annual Meetings from 2005 to 2012 is only 17% as of September 2014 , which is very low compared to the average rate of 44.5% among other biomedical science abstracts in a Cochrane review . Although they may be in a condensed format, these abstracts can have a significant impact on decision‐making and medical practice of meetings' attendees, as there is a lack of published literature in the field, and as it is well expected that there will be a delay in publication between presented abstracts and the corresponding peer‐reviewed articles in PubMed . This allows authors the opportunity to modify methods based on feedback from attendees at the meetings and thus, the results and conclusions may be altered.…”

The apheresis management of patients undergoing transplantation: a concise review

“…Of note, the majority of TA indications in the 2016 ASFA guidelines are Category III indications with Grade 2C (weakest level of evidence) . One source of evidence is the abstracts presented at national meetings; however, the rate of conversion of abstracts into peer‐reviewed publications has been low for apheresis . As the ASFA guidelines depend on published apheresis evidence for their recommendations, it is essential for the apheresis community to publish its experiences, including case reports or case series in addition to larger studies, describing situations for which TA works as well as scenarios in which TA is not beneficial clinically.…”