Background Some effective public health interventions may increase inequalities by disproportionately benefiting less disadvantaged groups (‘intervention-generated inequalities’ or IGIs). There is a ...need to understand which types of interventions are likely to produce IGIs, and which can reduce inequalities. Methods We conducted a rapid overview of systematic reviews to identify evidence on IGIs by socioeconomic status. We included any review of non-healthcare interventions in high-income countries presenting data on differential intervention effects on any health status or health behaviour outcome. Results were synthesised narratively. Results The following intervention types show some evidence of increasing inequalities (IGIs) between socioeconomic status groups: media campaigns; and workplace smoking bans. However, for many intervention types, data on potential IGIs are lacking. By contrast, the following show some evidence of reducing health inequalities: structural workplace interventions; provision of resources; and fiscal interventions, such as tobacco pricing. Conclusion Our findings are consistent with the idea that ‘downstream’ preventive interventions are more likely to increase health inequalities than ‘upstream’ interventions. More consistent reporting of differential intervention effectiveness is required to help build the evidence base on IGIs.
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The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) statement, published in 2009, was designed to help systematic reviewers transparently report why the review was done, ...what the authors did, and what they found. Over the past decade, advances in systematic review methodology and terminology have necessitated an update to the guideline. The PRISMA 2020 statement replaces the 2009 statement and includes new reporting guidance that reflects advances in methods to identify, select, appraise, and synthesise studies. The structure and presentation of the items have been modified to facilitate implementation. In this article, we present the PRISMA 2020 27-item checklist, an expanded checklist that details reporting recommendations for each item, the PRISMA 2020 abstract checklist, and the revised flow diagrams for original and updated reviews.
The methods and results of systematic reviews should be reported in sufficient detail to allow users to assess the trustworthiness and applicability of the review findings. The Preferred Reporting ...Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) statement was developed to facilitate transparent and complete reporting of systematic reviews and has been updated (to PRISMA 2020) to reflect recent advances in systematic review methodology and terminology. Here, we present the explanation and elaboration paper for PRISMA 2020, where we explain why reporting of each item is recommended, present bullet points that detail the reporting recommendations, and present examples from published reviews. We hope that changes to the content and structure of PRISMA 2020 will facilitate uptake of the guideline and lead to more transparent, complete, and accurate reporting of systematic reviews.
To ensure a systematic review is valuable to users, authors should prepare a transparent, complete, and accurate account of why the review was done, what they did (such as how studies were identified ...and selected) and what they found (such as characteristics of contributing studies and results of meta-analyses). ...technological advances have enabled the use of natural language processing and machine learning to identify relevant evidence 22,23,24, methods have been proposed to synthesise and present findings when meta-analysis is not possible or appropriate 25,26,27, and new methods have been developed to assess the risk of bias in results of included studies 28, 29. ...the publishing landscape has transformed, with multiple avenues now available for registering and disseminating systematic review protocols 33, 34, disseminating reports of systematic reviews, and sharing data and materials, such as preprint servers and publicly accessible repositories. ...extensions to the PRISMA 2009 statement have been developed to guide reporting of network meta-analyses 49, meta-analyses of individual participant data 50, systematic reviews of harms 51, systematic reviews of diagnostic test accuracy studies 52, and scoping reviews 53; for these types of reviews we recommend authors report their review in accordance with the recommendations in PRISMA 2020 along with the guidance specific to the extension.
In systematic reviews that lack data amenable to meta-analysis, alternative synthesis methods are commonly used, but these methods are rarely reported. This lack of transparency in the methods can ...cast doubt on the validity of the review findings. The Synthesis Without Meta-analysis (SWiM) guideline has been developed to guide clear reporting in reviews of interventions in which alternative synthesis methods to meta-analysis of effect estimates are used. This article describes the development of the SWiM guideline for the synthesis of quantitative data of intervention effects and presents the nine SWiM reporting items with accompanying explanations and examples.
Decision makers in public health practice and policy rely on access to trustworthy, relevant, synthesized evidence. The second edition of the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions ...('the Handbook') reflects a major revision in guidance for authors of systematic reviews, incorporating a decade of methodological development and a number of significant changes to previous recommendations. This paper aims to highlight new guidance that addresses a number of key methodological challenges for authors of systematic reviews in public health.
The revised Handbook includes guidance on framing public health research questions for synthesis, considering equity, intervention complexity, risk of bias assessment and synthesis methods other than meta-analysis. Reviews of public health interventions frequently encounter the types of methodological complexity addressed in this new guidance.
We hope that readers will find that the Cochrane Handbook includes detailed and thoughtful guidance on both conceptualizing and executing systematic reviews relevant to public health questions. Considering the available methods guidance will, we hope, provide support for authors of public health reviews to tackle the challenges they encounter, strengthen their analysis and provide useful answers to the important questions asked by stakeholders and users of public health evidence.
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We outline CONSORT-Equity 2017 reporting standards, an extension to the CONSORT (Consolidated Standards of Reporting Trials) statement that aims to improve the reporting of intervention effects in ...randomised trials where health equity is relevant. Health inequities are unfair differences in health that can be avoided by reasonable action. We defined a randomised trial where health equity is relevant as one that assesses effects on health equity by evaluating an intervention focused on people experiencing social disadvantage or by exploring the difference in the effect of the intervention between two groups (or as a gradient across more than two groups) experiencing different levels of social disadvantage, or both. We held a consensus meeting with diverse potential users from high, middle, and low income countries, including knowledge users such as patients and methodologists. We discussed evidence for each proposed extension item from empirical studies, reviews, key informant interviews, and an online survey, aiming to improve clarity of reporting without imposing undue burden on authors. The new guidance contains equity extensions to 16 items from CONSORT 2010 plus one new item on research ethics reporting, with examples of good practice and a brief explanation and elaboration for each. Widespread uptake of this guidance for the reporting of trials where health equity is relevant will make it easier for decision makers to find and use evidence from randomised trials to reduce unfair inequalities in health.
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