Identification of meta-analyses. The need for standard terminology.
Our efforts to identify published articles describing meta-analyses of clinical trials illustrate the need for standard terminology to facilitate retrieval. We found 119 articles describing meta-analyses and eligible for inclusion in MEDLINE, and yet when we searched MEDLINE, using strategies based on textwords and medical subject headings (MeSH), only 48% of the 119 articles were identified. Sixty-eight (57%) of the 119 articles contained at least one of the terms "meta-analysis," "pooling," or "overview" in the title or abstract. The importance of meta-analyses in the evaluation of medical treatments argues for more disciplined use of a specific term in order to facilitate identification of articles. The fact that the National Library of Medicine has started in 1989 to index articles describing meta-analyses using the MeSH META-ANALYSIS underscores this argument.
Dickersin
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Department of Epidemiology, Johns Hopkins University, School of Hygiene and Public Health, Baltimore, Maryland.
Higgins
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K
Meinert
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D002986:Clinical Trials as Topic; D006801:Humans; D007256:Information Systems; D008523:MEDLARS; D015201:Meta-Analysis as Topic; D009626:Terminology as Topic; D014481:United States