Users' guide to the surgical literature: how to use a systematic literature review and meta-analysis.

An evidence-based approach to surgery incorporates patients’ circumstances or predicaments, identifies knowledge gaps and frames questions to fill those gaps, conducts efficient literature searches, critically appraises the research evidence and applies that evidence to patient care. The practice of evidence-based medicine, therefore, is a process of lifelong self-directed learning in which caring for patients creates a need for clinically important information about diagnoses, prognoses, treatments and other health care issues. 1,2

[1]  J. Rodenhiser,et al.  Competing interests: None declared. , 2005 .

[2]  Gordon H. Guyatt,et al.  Treatment of Acute Achilles Tendon Ruptures A Systematic Overview and Metaanalysis , 2002, Clinical orthopaedics and related research.

[3]  Gordon H. Guyatt,et al.  Users' Guides to the Medical Literature: A Manual for Evidence-Based Clinical Practice; Users' Guides to the Medical Literature: Essentials of Evidence-Based Clinical Practice , 2003, BMJ : British Medical Journal.

[4]  M. Bhandari,et al.  Meta-Analyses in Orthopaedic Surgery: A Systematic Review of Their Methodologies , 2001, The Journal of bone and joint surgery. American volume.

[5]  G H Guyatt,et al.  Publication bias: a brief review for clinicians. , 2000, Mayo Clinic proceedings.

[6]  C. Colton.  Statistical correctness. , 2000, Journal of orthopaedic trauma.

[7]  A Laupacis,et al.  Assessing the quality of randomized trials: reliability of the Jadad scale. , 1999, Controlled clinical trials.

[8]  D. Cook,et al.  Does quality of reports of randomised trials affect estimates of intervention efficacy reported in meta-analyses? , 1998, The Lancet.

[9]  A. Jadad,et al.  The importance of quality of primary studies in producing unbiased systematic reviews. , 1996, Archives of internal medicine.

[10]  Diane P. Martin,et al.  Musculoskeletal function assessment instrument: Criterion and construct validity , 1996, Journal of orthopaedic research : official publication of the Orthopaedic Research Society.

[11]  A R Jadad,et al.  Assessing the quality of reports of randomized clinical trials: is blinding necessary? , 1996, Controlled clinical trials.

[12]  J. Villar,et al.  Predictive ability of meta-analyses of randomised controlled trials , 1995, The Lancet.

[13]  D. Cook,et al.  Methodologic guidelines for systematic reviews of randomized control trials in health care from the Potsdam Consultation on Meta-Analysis. , 1995, Journal of clinical epidemiology.

[14]  G H Guyatt,et al.  Users' guides to the medical literature. VI. How to use an overview. Evidence-Based Medicine Working Group. , 1994, JAMA.

[15]  C D Naylor,et al.  Incorporating variations in the quality of individual randomized trials into meta-analysis. , 1992, Journal of clinical epidemiology.

[16]  R. Deyo,et al.  Surgery for Lumbar Spinal Stenosis: Attempted Meta‐Analysis of the Literature , 1992, Spine.

[17]  K. Dickersin.  The existence of publication bias and risk factors for its occurrence. , 1990, JAMA.

[18]  K. Dickersin,et al.  Publication bias and clinical trials. , 1987, Controlled clinical trials.

[19]  N. Breslow,et al.  Statistical methods in cancer research: volume 1- The analysis of case-control studies , 1980 .

[20]  R. Rosenthal,et al.  Statistical versus traditional procedures for summarizing research findings. , 1980, Psychological bulletin.

[21]  J. Fleiss.  Measuring agreement between two judges on the presence or absence of a trait. , 1975, Biometrics.