Analysis of practices to promote reproducibility and transparency in anesthesiology research: Are important aspects "hidden behind the drapes?"

Introduction: Reliable, high quality research is essential to the field of anesthesiology. Investigating reproducibility and transparency has been accomplished broadly in the biomedical domain and in the social sciences; however, practices that promote reproducibility and transparency have never been evaluated in the anesthesiology research community. In this study, we applied 14 indicators of reproducibility to evaluate the current climate of the anesthesiology research community.Methods: We used the National Library of Medicine (NLM) catalog to search for all journals using the subject terms tag Anesthesiology[ST]. The inclusion criteria required that journals provided full-text publications in English and were MEDLINE indexed. The list of journals in the NLM catalog fitting the inclusion criteria were then extracted using the electronic International Standard Serial Number (ISSN). This series of ISSN were used in a PubMed search to identify all publications within these journals. We then limited the sample to publications from January 1, 2014 to December 31, 2018. Subsequently, we randomly sampled 300 publications that fit the inclusion criteria for our analysis. Data extraction was then conducted in a blinded, duplicate fashion using a pilot-tested Google form.Results: The PubMed search of these journals identified 171,441 publications, with 28,310 being within the time-frame. From the 300 publications sampled, 296 (296/300, 98% [97% to 99%]) full text publications were obtained, while 4 (4/300, 1% [0% to 3%]) only showed the abstract or could not be accessed. Most (104/107, 97% [95% to 99%]) of the studies did not include material availability statements or protocol availability statements. For the analysis scripts, the majority of publications (121/122, 99% [98% to 100%]) did not provide a data analysis script statement. The majority (94/122, 77% [72% to 81%]) of the publications did not contain a pre-registration statement. Other study characteristics were found to be insufficient.Conclusion: Anesthesiology research needs to drastically improve with regards to reproducibility and transparency. By making research easily accessible online and by improving the accessibility of detailed components (raw data, materials and protocols, analysis scripts) primary research can be reproduced in subsequent studies and help contribute to the development of new practice guidelines, helping change patient care through evidence-based conclusions

Use of behavioural change taxonomies in systematic reviews and meta-analyses regarding obesity management

Aims: We investigated the prevalence of behavioral change taxonomies in systematic reviews and meta-analyses related to obesity management. In addition, we analyzed the funding sources, author conflicts of interest statements, risk of bias, and favorability of the results in such studies to determine if there was a relationship between methodological quality and taxonomy use.Methods: We searched several databases including MEDLINE, Epistemonikos, Cochrane EDSR, Pubmed, and Embase for systematic reviews and meta-analyses regarding the behavioral treatment of obesity. Screening and data extraction was performed in a masked, duplicate fashion. We performed statistical analyses to determine any significant association between use of taxonomy and study characteristics.Results: Fifteen (of 186; 8.06%) systematic reviews used a taxonomy—9 used the BCTTv1, 3 used OXFAB, 2 used the CALO-RE, and 1 used “Taxonomy of choice architecture techniques.” Most interventions that referenced a taxonomy were self-mediated (6/60, 10%). Behavioral change taxonomies were mentioned in 10 (of 87, 11.49%) studies with a public funding source. Of the studies with favorable results, 14 studies (of 181, 7.73%) referred to a taxonomy. We found no statistically significant relationships between use of taxonomy and study characteristics.Conclusions: We found that systematic reviews regarding the management of obesity rarely mention a behavioral change taxonomy. Given the global burden of obesity, it is crucial that behavioral change techniques are reproducible and translatable. We recommend that researchers look further into how taxonomies affect the quality and reproducibility of behavioral interventions in an effort to improve patient outcomes

Ochije Okonya's Quick Files

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Use of taxonomies in systematic reviews regarding obesity management

Obesity is a complex and multifactorial disease1–3 that remains one of the leading causes of preventable death worldwide.4 Despite profound efforts to control the global burden of the disease,5–7 the prevalence and financial impact8,9 continue to rise dramatically.10 Furthermore, obesity is a major risk factor leading to a wide variety of medical comorbidities, notably, diabetes mellitus11 and cardiovascular disease.12 There have been many studies to determine the most effective interventions for obesity. However, these interventions must be standardized such that replicable techniques can be used to improve patient outcomes. Given the vast amount of interventions for obesity, prior efforts have been taken to organize the most effective behavioral change techniques into taxonomies. CALO-RE, developed as a 40-item taxonomy in 2011, defines strategies interventionists may incorporate in their treatment.13 Whereas OXFAB, published in 2016, is a 117-item questionnaire that assesses specific cognitive and behavioral weight control strategies used by individuals.14 These taxonomies were created so that obesity researchers have consistent language when evaluating the efficacy of particular weight loss interventions. Previous obesity research has examined the completeness of intervention reporting,15 yet no study has analyzed adherence to taxonomies such as CALO-RE and OXFAB. Prior to the creation of CALO-RE and OXFAB, there was no standardization of weight loss techniques and inconsistent reporting of results. The impact of these taxonomies has not yet been evaluated. In this study, we will conduct a large-scale systematic review to investigate whether systematic reviews specifically refer to a taxonomy such as CALO-RE or OXFAB when evaluating behavioral change techniques