Abstracts of systematic reviews and meta-analyses investigating meniscal root repair exhibit a high prevalence of reporting bias

Background

To present rates of reporting bias in systematic reviews and meta-analyses investigating meniscal root repair.

Methods

In this systematic review, PubMed, Scopus and Web of Science databases were queried for studies that investigated meniscal root tears treated with root repair. Included studies were systematic reviews and/or meta-analyses published in peer-reviewed journals in the English language with available full-texts. Each abstract was graded in a binary fashion for 15 most severe types of spin. Fisher’s exact test was used to determine if spin varied significantly by year, journal, level of evidence, funding source, or A Measurement Tool to Assess Systematic Reviews Version 2 (AMSTAR 2) confidence category.

Results

Twenty studies were included. All abstracts exhibited spin with a maximum of eight types of spin. The most prevalent categories of spin were “Misleading Reporting” (n = 18), “Inappropriate Extrapolation” (n = 13), and “Misleading Interpretation” (n = 12). There were significant associations between external funding and spin types: 5 (“The conclusion claims the beneficial effect of the experimental treatment despite a high risk of bias in primary studies”) (p = 0.019), 9 (“Conclusion claims the beneficial effect of the experimental treatment despite reporting bias”) (p < 0.001), and 15 (“Conclusion extrapolates the review’s findings to a different population or setting”) (p = 0.049). AMSTAR 2 confidence rating was either “low” (n = 2) or “critically low” (n = 18) in all 20 studies.

Conclusion

This study demonstrated a high prevalence of reporting bias in the abstracts of systematic reviews and meta-analyses investigating meniscal root repair, with significant associations with external funding.