characteristics of the studies that they regard as important for readers of the review to know. The following optional subheadings may be helpful: Design Sample sizes Setting Participants Interventions Outcomes This should refer to the information contained in the of Excluded Studies’ tables, providing a succinct ‘Characteristics summary of why studies were excluded from the review. The following optional (level 2) headings may be used: Ongoing studies Studies awaiting assessment New studies found at this update This should summarize the general quality of the included studies, its variability across studies and any important flaws in individual studies. The criteria that were used to assess the risk of bias should be described or referenced under and not here. How each study was rated on each criterion should be reported in an additional table and not ‘Methods’ described in detail in the text, which should be a concise summary. For large reviews, aspects of the quality assessment may be summarized for the primary outcomes under the following headings. Attempts to conceal allocation of intervention assignment and methods for generation of the sequence of allocations should be summarized here, along with any judgments concerning the risk of bias that may arise from the methods used. A summary of who was blinded during the conduct and analysis of the should be reported here. Blinding of outcome assessment should be summarized for each main outcome. Judgments concerning the risk of bias associated with blinding should be summarized. The completeness of data should be summarized here for each of the main outcomes. Concerns over exclusion of participants and excessive (or differential) drop-out should be reported. Concerns over the selective availability of data should be summarized here, including evidence of selective reporting of outcomes, time points, subgroups or analyses. Any other potential concerns should be summarized here.
characteristics of the studies that they regard as important for readers of the review to know. The following optional subheadings may be helpful: Design Sample sizes Setting Participants Interventions Outcomes This should refer to the information contained in the ‘Characteristics of Excluded Studies’ tables, providing a succinct summary of why studies were excluded from the review. The following optional (level 2) headings may be used: Ongoing studies Studies awaiting assessment New studies found at this update This should summarize the general quality of the included studies, its variability across studies and any important flaws in individual studies. The criteria that were used to assess the risk of bias should be described or referenced under ‘Methods’ and not here. How each study was rated on each criterion should be reported in an additional table and not described in detail in the text, which should be a concise summary. For large reviews, aspects of the quality assessment may be summarized for the primary outcomes under the following headings. Attempts to conceal allocation of intervention assignment and methods for generation of the sequence of allocations should be summarized here, along with any judgments concerning the risk of bias that may arise from the methods used. A summary of who was blinded during the conduct and analysis of the should be reported here. Blinding of outcome assessment should be summarized for each main outcome. Judgments concerning the risk of bias associated with blinding should be summarized. The completeness of data should be summarized here for each of the main outcomes. Concerns over exclusion of participants and excessive (or differential) drop-out should be reported. Concerns over the selective availability of data should be summarized here, including evidence of selective reporting of outcomes, time points, subgroups or analyses. Any other potential concerns should be summarized here.
review_guidance_for_completion.docx