Reporting of critical care trial abstracts: a comparison before and after the announcement of CONSORT guideline for abstracts

Abstract

BackgroundAn extension of the Consolidated Standards of Reporting Trials (CONSORT) statement provides a checklist of items to improve the reporting quality of abstracts of randomized controlled trials (RCTs). However, authors of abstracts in some fields have poorly adhered to this guideline. We did an extensive literature survey to examine the quality of reporting trial abstracts in major critical care journals before and after announcement of the CONSORT guideline for abstracts.MethodsWe reviewed abstracts of RCTs published in four major critical care journals with publication dates ranging from 2006 to 2007 (pre-CONSORT) and from 2011 to 2012 (post-CONSORT): Intensive Care Medicine (ICM), Critical Care (CC), American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine (AJRCCM), and Critical Care Medicine (CCM). For each item in the CONSORT guideline for abstracts, we considered that an abstract was well-reported when it reported a relevant item and adhered to the guideline. Our primary outcomes were to describe the proportion of abstracts that adhered to the guideline for each item in each period and the changes between the two periods. Pearson’s chi-square analysis was performed to compare adherence to the guideline between the two periods.ResultsOur inclusion criteria yielded 185 and 166 abstracts from pre- and post-CONSORT periods, respectively. Less than 50% of abstracts adequately reported trial design (16.3%), participants (44.0%), outcomes in methods (49.4%), randomization (1.8%), blinding (4.2%), numbers randomized (37.4%) and analyzed (8.4%), recruitment (4.2%), outcomes in results (16.9%), harms (27.7%), trial registration (42.2%), and funding (13.9%) in the recent period. There was significant improvement in reporting title, primary outcomes in both methods and results, interventions, harms, trial registration, and funding between the two periods (p < 0.05). Improvements were seen in reporting of participants in the Methods sections in CCM, as well as in outcomes in results and trial registration in AJRCCM and CCM, between the two periods. A significant decline was noted in reporting of interventions in Methods sections in AJRCCM and ICM, as well as the numbers randomized in Results sections in CC, over time.ConclusionsReporting of some items in abstracts for critical care trials improved over time, but the adherence to the CONSORT guideline for abstracts was still suboptimal.

High-profile studies frequently and repetitively present data on the same patients, particularly in immunotherapy studies

“…The importance of information conveyed by conference abstracts is especially acute in geographic regions with limited access to medical literature (5). If physicians are only able to access conference abstracts in place of fulllength papers, they are particularly reliant on the authors to represent all key pieces of information clearly in the abstract (5). This problem has been previously discussed with regards to standardization of conference abstracts (5).…”

“…If physicians are only able to access conference abstracts in place of fulllength papers, they are particularly reliant on the authors to represent all key pieces of information clearly in the abstract (5). This problem has been previously discussed with regards to standardization of conference abstracts (5). This discussion is also relevant in the factual representation of information.…”

“…This statement attempted to standardize the information published in abstracts concerning clinical trials (1) ( Table 1). A recent study examined the adherence to the CONSORT consensus statement in the field of critical care medicine (5). This work found improvement in some areas but still reported substandard adherence to CONSORT statement (5).…”

“…A recent study examined the adherence to the CONSORT consensus statement in the field of critical care medicine (5). This work found improvement in some areas but still reported substandard adherence to CONSORT statement (5). Another investigation in the field of HIV/AIDS research reported a small improvement in some areas but a similar inconsistency in complying with the CONSORT recommendations (6).…”

Capsule Commentary on Lin et. al. Empirical Comparison of Publication Bias Tests in Meta-analysis

“…Third, reviewers and editors need to endorse the reporting guidelines (ex, CONSORT) for original studies. 4 This allows confirmation of or request for the otherwise unpublished results by looking through study protocols or trial registries. Finally, consumers of meta-analyses need to remain cautious because it is impossible to identify all unpublished data.…”