Journal of Obesity & Weight Loss Therapy
Open Access

Abstract

Background: AMSTAR 2 is a critical appraisal tool for the methodological quality of systematic reviews (that include randomized or non-randomized studies or both) of healthcare interventions. It has 16 items, among them 5 are identified as critical domains (which can affect the validity of a review and its conclusions). Objectives: To assess the quality of studies published as SR or MA in the field of bariatrics (BS) in 2016-2017. Methods: Following a protocol published in PROSPERO (CRD42017080394) we identified SR and MA in BS by searching of 3 databases using pre-specified search strategy. Two authors independently: Reviewed all titles and abstracts, assessed full texts of potentially eligible studies and are extracting the data and assessing the quality of included studies using AMSTAR 2 checklist. Any discrepancies are resolved with discussion and help from the third reviewer. Results: Until July 2018 three papers using the AMSTAR 2 tool for the assessment of the reviews were published in PubMed database, but none of them in BS. Two studies assessing the quallity of reviews in BS using AMSTAR tool. One of them included 32 SRs, which were all assessed as moderate quality. Second study assessed the quality of nine SRs of RCTs published from 1999 to 2012 as moderate or high quality. Such a small sample of studies assessed does not reflect the overall quality of SR and MA published in bariatrics. Our study included 74 recently published SRs and MAs. Conclusions: The quality of studies published as SR and MA in 2016-2017 in BS is highly unsatisfactory.

Biography

Monika Storman, a PhD candidate at Department of Internal Medicine and Diabetology, Medical University of Warsaw, graduated from Jagiellonian University Medical College, Krakow, Poland. The presented abstract was created as part of the project: “Systematic Insight into Obesity” in Jagiellonian University Medical College in Krakow, financed as Grant from European.

E-mail: monika.storman@wp.pl