The DOI matches its Crossref record; 18 of the 18 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Cochrane Centralised Search Service showed high sensitivity identifying randomized controlled trials: A retrospective analysis
Open accessAbstract
BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: The Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL) is compiled from a number of sources, including PubMed and Embase. Since 2017, we have increased the number of sources feeding into CENTRAL and improved the efficiency of our processes through the use of application programming interfaces, machine learning, and crowdsourcing.Our objectives were twofold: (1) Assess the effectiveness of Cochrane's centralized search and screening processes to correctly identify references to published reports which are eligible for inclusion in Cochrane systematic reviews of randomized controlled trials (RCTs). (2) Identify opportunities to improve the performance of Cochrane's centralized search and screening processes to identify references to eligible trials. METHODS: We identified all references to RCTs (either published journal articles or trial registration records) with a publication or registration date between 1st January 2017 and 31st December 2018 that had been included in a Cochrane intervention review. We then viewed an audit trail for each included reference to determine if it had been identified by our centralized search process and subsequently added to CENTRAL. RESULTS: We identified 650 references to included studies with a publication year of 2017 or 2018. Of those, 634 (97.5%) had been captured by Cochrane's Centralised Search Service. Sixteen references had been missed by the Cochrane's Centralised Search Service: six had PubMed-not-MEDLINE status, four were missed by the centralized Embase search, three had been misclassified by Cochrane Crowd, one was from a journal not indexed in MEDLINE or Embase, one had only been added to Embase in 2019, and one reference had been rejected by the automated RCT machine learning classifier. Of the sixteen missed references, eight were the main or only publication to the trial in the review in which it had been included. CONCLUSION: This analysis has shown that Cochrane's centralized search and screening processes are highly sensitive. It has also helped us to understand better why some references to eligible RCTs have been missed. The CSS is playing a critical role in helping to populate CENTRAL and is moving us toward making CENTRAL a comprehensive repository of RCTs.
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“as CENTRAL is currently only updated once a month 9 39 42”
From Updated recommendations for the Cochrane rapid review methods guidance for rapid reviews of effectiveness (2024) · cites this paper as [9]
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“Although none met the original eligibility criteria, five studies provided further insights to the search recommendations.[8][9][10][11][12]”
From Updated recommendations for the Cochrane rapid review methods guidance for rapid reviews of effectiveness (2024) · cites this paper as [9]
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“Additional searches of Medline, such as through PubMed, and possibly Embase (if access is available) may be limited to the previous two months to capture the most recently published studies, as CENTRAL is currently only updated once a month.9 39 42”
From Updated recommendations for the Cochrane rapid review methods guidance for rapid reviews of effectiveness (2024) · cites this paper as [9]
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Self-citationDefining the criteria for including studies and how they will be grouped for the synthesis
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Should meta-analysts search Embase in addition to Medline?
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Development of a search filter to identify reports of controlled clinical trials within CINAHL Plus
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Self-citationThe contribution of databases to the results of systematic reviews: a cross-sectional study
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“Several research articles have sought to evaluate the comprehensiveness of other major bibliographic databases [14e17] or trial registries [18].”
BackgroundTranslating the Cochrane EMBASE RCT filter from the Ovid interface to Embase.com: a case study
Glanville, J., Foxlee, R., Wisniewski, S., Noel-Storr, A. H., Edwards, M., & Dooley, G. (2019) · Health Information & Libraries Journal · doi:10.1111/hir.12269 · Cited by 97
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Self-citationWhen to include clinical study reports and regulatory documents in systematic reviews
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Self-citationRandomized trials are frequently fragmented in multiple secondary publications
Ebrahim, S., Montoya, L., el Din, M. K., Sohani, Z. N., Agarwal, A., Bance, S., Saquib, J., Saquib, N., & Ioannidis, J. P. A. (2016) · Journal of Clinical Epidemiology · doi:10.1016/j.jclinepi.2016.05.016 · Cited by 34
Complementary approaches to searching MEDLINE may be sufficient for updating systematic reviews
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Cited by
Sorted by citations
Thomas, J., McDonald, S., Noel-Storr, A., Shemilt, I., Elliott, J., Mavergames, C., & Marshall, I. J. (2021) · Journal of Clinical Epidemiology · doi:10.1016/j.jclinepi.2020.11.003 · Cited by 253
Self-citationGarritty, C., Hamel, C., Trivella, M., Gartlehner, G., Nussbaumer-Streit, B., Devane, D., Kamel, C., Griebler, U., & King, V. J. (2024) · BMJ · doi:10.1136/bmj-2023-076335 · Cited by 260
Palivizumab for preventing severe respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) infection in children
Garegnani, L., Styrmisdóttir, L., Rodríguez, P. R., Liquitay, C. M. E., Esteban, I., & Franco, J. V. A. (2021) · Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews · doi:10.1002/14651858.cd013757.pub2 · Cited by 185
Music therapy for autistic people
Geretsegger, M., Fusar‐Poli, L., Elefant, C., Mössler, K. A., Vitale, G., & Gold, C. (2022) · Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews · doi:10.1002/14651858.cd004381.pub4 · Cited by 163
Orton, J., Doyle, L. W., Tripathi, T., Boyd, R. N., Anderson, P. J., & Spittle, A. J. (2024) · Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews · doi:10.1002/14651858.cd005495.pub5 · Cited by 98
Metadata
- Authors
- Noel-Storr, A. H., Dooley, G., Wisniewski, S., Glanville, J., Thomas, J., Cox, S., Featherstone, R., & Foxlee, R.
- Affiliations
- University of Oxford (GB)
- University of York (GB)
- University College London (GB)
- Cochrane (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Noel-Storr, A.H.
- Venue
- Journal of Clinical Epidemiology
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2020-11
- Volume
- 127
- Pages
- 142-150
- ISSN
- 0895-4356 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W3048480974
- Cited by
- 136
- References
- 18
- Citations by year
- 2026: 10 · 2025: 30 · 2024: 27 · 2023: 21 · 2022: 26 · 2021: 19 · 2020: 3
- FWCI
- 10.40
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Journal of Clinical Epidemiology (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- UCL Discovery (University College London) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Medical Research Council (MR/J005037/1)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › Statistics, Probability and Uncertainty › Meta-analysis and systematic reviews
- Social Sciences › Library and Information Sciences › scientometrics and bibliometrics research
- Social Sciences › Library and Information Sciences › Academic Publishing and Open Access
- Keywords
- randomized controlled trials, search sensitivity, MEDLINE, Embase, crowdsourcing, machine learning classifiers, audit trail
- MeSH terms
- Machine Learning, Systematic Reviews as Topic, Data Aggregation, Humans, Registries, Retrospective Studies, Sensitivity and Specificity, Randomized Controlled Trials as Topic, Databases, Bibliographic, MEDLINE, Information Storage and Retrieval, PubMed, Crowdsourcing
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