I read chapter 8 many times in cochrane handbook, but there are certain domains I can't fahom in risk of bias tool
1. What diff between blinding and concealment? Blinding can easily mentioned in paper, but how to figure out concealment?
2. How can I figure out from the paper if incomplete data outcome, or selective reporting? What key words to search for? I read the handbook and still can't figure out
thak you
Dear Heba,
1. Iwould suggest reading this paper: Sedgwick, P. (2013). Allocation concealment versus blinding in randomised controlled trials, BMJ:347:f5518
2. When you review a study you need to identify whether the study answers only the questions you are looking for. If the authors did not mention that they had missing data (regardless the reason) go ahead. They may point to the bias in study limitations.
Hope this helps
Thank you Samir. I did not get the second point. What this indicates if author mentioned he had missing data?
If they have missing data you follow the Cochrane Collaboration Handbook Guidelines regarding this point:
• Low risk of bias: No missing outcome data, reasons for missing outcome data unlikely to be related to true outcome.
• High risk of bias: Reasons for missing outcome data likely to be related to true outcome.
• Unclear: Insufficient information to permit judgment
So you mark every point separately; which means that if the other five points were fine and you have a scale of 1-3 for every point, the study would get an overall score of 5/6. This means that the study met five out of six criteria with low risk of bias.
- Badges
- Science topic
- Similar topics
- Methodology
- Research Methodology