Red Cell Transfusion in Acute Myocardial Infarction: AABB International Clinical Practice Guidelines.

Description: Optimal transfusion strategies for patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI) are uncertain. The aim of this guideline is to provide recommendations for red blood cell transfusion in patients with AMI.

Methods: These guidelines are based on evidence from randomized controlled trials of patients presenting with AMI and assigned to 2 different transfusion strategies (restrictive or liberal) based on hemoglobin concentrations or hematocrit levels before receipt of a transfusion.

Medications for adults with type 2 diabetes: a living systematic review and network meta-analysis.

Objective: To provide up-to-date evidence on key benefits, harms, and uncertainties regarding medications for adults with type 2 diabetes.

Design: Living systematic review and network meta-analysis (NMA), using frequentist random effects and GRADE (grading of recommendations, assessment, development and evaluation) approaches. Updates are planned at least two times a year.

Nutrition Users' Guides: an introduction to structured guides to evaluate the nutrition literature.

Despite evidence that nutrition can play a substantial role in curbing the burden of chronic disease, findings reported in the nutrition literature have been plagued with debate and uncertainty, including questions about the confidence we can place in evidence from observational studies, the validity of dietary intake data, and the applicability of randomised trials to real-world patients or members of the public. Structured nutrition users' guides (NUGs) to evaluate common research study designs (ie, randomised trials, cohort studies, systematic reviews and clinical practice guidelines) addressing nutrition questions will help clinicians and their patients, as well as health service workers and policy-makers, use the evidence to make more informed decisions on disease management and prevention. In addition, NUGs will provide comprehensive teaching materials for nutrition trainees on how to appraise, interpret and apply the research evidence.

Reporting Guideline for Chatbot Health Advice Studies: The CHART Statement.

Importance: The rise in chatbot health advice (CHA) studies is accompanied by heterogeneity in reporting standards, impacting their interpretability.

Objective: To provide reporting recommendations for studies evaluating the performance of generative artificial intelligence (AI)-driven chatbots when summarizing clinical evidence and providing health advice.

Design, Setting, And Participants: CHART was developed in several phases after performing a comprehensive systematic review to identify variation in the conduct, reporting, and methodology in CHA studies.

Prevalence of symptom exaggeration among North American independent medical evaluation examinees: A systematic review of observational studies.

Background: Independent medical evaluations (IMEs) are commonly acquired to provide an assessment of impairment; however, these assessments show poor inter-rater reliability. One potential contributor is symptom exaggeration by patients, who may feel pressure to emphasize their level of impairment to qualify for incentives. This study explored the prevalence of symptom exaggeration among IME examinees in North America, which if common may represent an important consideration for improving the reliability of IMEs.

Triple therapy vs dual inhaler therapy for moderate-to-severe asthma: An updated systematic review and meta-analysis.

Background: Long-acting muscarinic antagonists are typically added to inhaled corticosteroids (ICS) and long-acting β-agonists (LABA) for asthma management.

Objective: To systematically synthesize the benefits and harms of triple therapy (ICS/LABA/long-acting muscarinic antagonists) compared with dual therapy (ICS/LABA) for asthma management across key subpopulations as part of developing linked American Academy of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology/American College of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology guidelines.

Methods: We searched MEDLINE, EMBASE, the Cochrane Controlled Register of Trials, and the International Clinical Trials Registry Platform from January 1, 2020 to February 1, 2025, for randomized trials comparing inhaled triple therapy to dual therapy for asthma to update our previous systematic review.

The Prevention of Smoking Relapse in Postpartum Women: A Systematic Review and Network Meta-analysis.

Objectives: To compare the effects of different interventions for maintaining smoking abstinence in postpartum individuals.

Methods: We searched PubMed, EMBASE, CENTRAL, CINAHL, PsycINFO, and ProQuest up to February 2024. Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) that studied the effects of any interventions on maintaining smoking abstinence in postpartum individuals who quit smoking before delivery were included.

Drug treatments for mild or moderate covid-19: systematic review and network meta-analysis.

Objective: To compare the effects of treatments for mild or moderate (that is, non-severe) coronavirus disease 2019 (covid-19).

Design: Systematic review and network meta-analysis.

Data Sources: Covid-19 Living Overview of Evidence Repository (covid-19 L-OVE) by the Epistemonikos Foundation, a public, living repository of covid-19 articles, from 1 January 2023 to 19 May 2024.

Completeness of reporting of simulation studies on responder analysis methods and simulation performance: a methodological survey.

Objectives: To evaluate the completeness of reporting of simulation studies on responder analysis methods and simulation performance.

Design: Systematic methodological survey.

Data Sources: We searched Embase, MEDLINE (via Ovid), PubMed and Web of Science Core Collection from inception to 9 October 2023.

The CLUE postsurgery VTE risk instrument for abdominal and pelvic surgery: validation of patient risk factor component.

Venous thromboembolism (VTE) remains a major postoperative risk. Systematic reviews have established procedure-specific VTE risk estimates, which form 1 component of the CLUE postsurgery VTE risk instrument. The instrument also incorporates patient-level factors, including age (≥75 years), body mass index (≥35 kg/m2), and prior VTE, to stratify overall risk.

Patient-Facing Digital Inhalers for Asthma: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.

Background: The benefits and harms of patient-facing digital inhalers (inhalers with a sensor providing patients immediate feedback on adherence and technique) for asthma remain unclear.

Objective: To systematically synthesize treatment outcomes of patient-facing digital inhalers for asthma.

Methods: As part of developing upcoming American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology and American College of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology Joint Task Force on Practice Parameters severe and difficult-to-control asthma guidelines, we searched MEDLINE, Embase, CENTRAL, CINAHL, PsycINFO, International Clinical Trials Registry Platform (ICTRP), and Latin American and Caribbean Literature on Health Sciences (LILACS), and monitored for additional studies to April 1, 2025, for randomized controlled trials evaluating patient-facing digital inhalers in asthma.

Common interventional procedures for chronic non-cancer spine pain: a systematic review and network meta-analysis of randomised trials.

Objective: To address the comparative effectiveness of common interventional procedures for chronic non-cancer (axial or radicular) spine pain.

Design: Systematic review and network meta-analysis (NMA) of randomised controlled trials (RCTs).

Data Sources: Medline, Embase, CINAHL, CENTRAL, and Web of Science from inception to 24 January 2023.

Nutrition users' guides: systematic reviews part 1 -structured guide for methodological assessment, interpretation and application of systematic reviews and meta-analyses of non-randomised nutritional epidemiology studies.

Due to the challenges of conducting randomised controlled trials (randomised trials) of dietary interventions, evidence in nutrition often comes from non-randomised (observational) studies of nutritional exposures-called nutritional epidemiology studies. When using systematic reviews of such studies to advise patients or populations on optimal dietary habits, users of the evidence (eg, healthcare professionals such as clinicians, health service and policy workers) should first evaluate the rigour (validity) and utility (applicability) of the systematic review. Issues in making this judgement include whether the review addressed a sensible question; included an exhaustive literature search; was scrupulous in the selection of studies and the collection of data; and presented results in a useful manner.

Nutrition Users' Guides: RCTs Part 2 - structured guide for interpreting and applying study results from randomised controlled trials on therapy or prevention questions.

This article continues from a prior commentary on evaluating the risk of bias in randomised controlled trials addressing nutritional interventions. Having provided a synopsis of the risk of bias issues, we now address how to understand trial results, including the interpretation of best estimates of effect and the corresponding precision (eg, 95% CIs), as well as the applicability of the evidence to patients based on their unique circumstances (eg, patients' values and preferences when trading off potential desirable and undesirable health outcomes and indicators (eg, cholesterol), and the potential burden and cost of an intervention). Authors can express the estimates of effect for health outcomes and indicators in relative terms (relative risks, relative risk reductions, OR or HRs)-measures that are generally consistent across populations-and absolute terms (risk differences)-measures that are more intuitive to clinicians and patients.

Nutrition users' guides: RCTs part 1 - structured guide for assessing risk of bias in randomised controlled trials that address therapy or prevention questions.

The purpose of this article, part 1 of 2 on randomised controlled trials (RCTs), is to provide readers (eg, clinicians, patients, health service and policy decision-makers) of the nutrition literature structured guidance on interpreting RCTs. Evaluation of a given RCT involves several considerations, including the potential for risk of bias, the assessment of estimates of effect and their corresponding precision, and the applicability of the evidence to one's patient. Risk of bias refers to flaws in the design or conduct of a study that may lead to a deviation from measuring the underlying true effect of an intervention.

Industry Funding by Itself is Not a Reason for Rating Down Studies for Risk of Bias.

To evaluate how study characteristics and methodological aspects compare based on presence or absence of industry funding, Hughes et al. conducted a systematic survey of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) published in three major medical journals. The authors found industry-funded RCTs were more likely to be blinded, post results on a clinical trials registration database (ClinicalTrials.

Inhaled Reliever Therapies for Asthma: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.

Importance: The optimal inhaled reliever therapy for asthma remains unclear.

Objective: To compare short-acting β agonists (SABA) alone with SABA combined with inhaled corticosteroids (ICS) and with the fast-onset, long-acting β agonist formoterol combined with ICS for asthma.

Data Sources: The MEDLINE, Embase, and CENTRAL databases were searched from January 1, 2020, to September 27, 2024, without language restrictions.

Protocol for a Series of Systematic Reviews and Network Meta-analyses of Randomized Controlled Trials of Medications for Patients with Overactive Bladder Symptoms.

Multiple randomized controlled trials (RCTs) have examined first-line pharmacological agents such as anticholinergics and β3 agonists for the management of overactive bladder symptoms (OAB). Although earlier systematic reviews and (network) meta-analyses aimed to summarize the evidence, a substantial number of trials were not included, so a comprehensive and methodologically rigorous evaluation of the comparative effectiveness of all first-line pharmacological treatments is lacking. We aim to conduct a series of systematic reviews and network meta-analyses (NMAs) for a comprehensive assessment of the effectiveness and safety of first-line pharmacological treatments for OAB.

The McMaster Cough Severity Questionnaire (MCSQ): a cough severity instrument for patients with refractory chronic cough.

Background: Cough severity represents an important end-point to assess the impact of therapies for patients with refractory chronic cough (RCC). Our objective was to develop a new patient-reported outcome measure addressing cough severity in patients with RCC.

Methods: Phase 1 (item generation): a systematic survey, focus groups and expert consultation generated 51 items.