Building up your table of comparisons
The table below is designed to help you construct your review question and subsequently set your inclusion and exclusion criteria. Using what you have learned and thought about in the above section, complete this table and finalise your question.
| Participants |
How is the disease/condition defined?
What are the most important characteristics that describe the participants relevant to your review?
Are there any relevant demographic factors? (ie age, sex, ethnicity)
What is the setting? (eg hospital, community etc)
Who should make the diagnosis?
Are there any co-morbidities to be excluded?
Are there any other types of people who should be excluded from your review (because they are likely to react to the intervention in a different way)?
How will studies involving only a subset of relevant participants be handled?
In one sentence describe your population, for example "All adults with tennis elbow (pain on lateral aspect of the elbow aggravated by use of the wrist or hand), diagnosed by a health care worker.”
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| Interventions |
What are the experimental and control (comparator) interventions of interest?
Does the intervention have variations (eg dosage, mode of delivery, personnel who deliver it, frequency of delivery, duration of delivery, timing of delivery)?
Are all variations to be included (for example is there a critical dose below which the intervention may not be clinically appropriate)?
How will trials including only part of the intervention be handled?
How will trials including the intervention of interest combined with another intervention (co-intervention) be handled?
In one sentence describe your intervention.
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| Comparisons |
What are you interested in comparing the intervention to? This depends on the primary question of the review. Are you only interested in whether the intervention offers benefit over the natural course of the disorder (ie a comparison to placebo or no treatment), or are you interested in whether the intervention offers benefit over other interventions.
List your possible comparisons:
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| Outcomes |
How do you think it is important to measure change with respect to this intervention in this population?
List all the outcomes you are including in your review. Consider outcomes relevant to all potential decision-makers, including economic data.
Divide your outcomes into primary (essential) outcomes and secondary. The main conclusions of your review will be based on the primary outcomes (usually three or fewer) so give this considerable thought. Primary outcomes are the two or three outcomes from among the main outcomes that the review would be likely to be able to address if sufficient studies are identified, in order to reach a conclusion about the effects (beneficial and adverse) of the intervention(s). Secondary outcomes include the remaining main outcomes (other than primary outcomes) plus additional outcomes useful for explaining effects.
Ensure the outcomes cover potential as well as actual adverse effects.
Consider the type and timing of outcome measurements.
Are there any methods of measurement or times to exclude (eg timing of outcomes that are clinically inappropriate or measurement tools that are not valid).
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| Types of study |
There may be some study methodology aspects that, if present, you feel renders that study so invalid to your review that it should be excluded. Some more common ones are lack of randomisation, failure to conceal allocation or, in reviews where the outcomes are very subjective (eg global assessment of improvement or levels of depression), blinding of the outcome assessor.
Are there any exclusions related to trial methodology in your review?
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| Review title |
As we have discussed already, the title of a Cochrane review usually follows the format:
Intervention for Problem in Category.
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