For randomized controlled trials, the quality of reports of complementary and alternative medicine was as good as reports of conventional medicine

Klassen, Terry P.; Pham, Ba'; Lawson, Margaret L.; Moher, David

doi:10.1016/j.jclinepi.2004.08.020

« Previous Next »Journal of Clinical Epidemiology
Volume 58, Issue 8 , Pages 763-768, August 2005

For randomized controlled trials, the quality of reports of complementary and alternative medicine was as good as reports of conventional medicine

Terry P. Klassen
- Department of Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Ba' Pham
- BioMedical Data Sciences, GlaxoSmithKline, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
- Chalmers Research Group, Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario Research Institute, 401 Smyth Road, Ottawa, Ontario K1H 2R7, Canada
- Department of Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Margaret L. Lawson
- Department of Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
David Moher
- Chalmers Research Group, Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario Research Institute, 401 Smyth Road, Ottawa, Ontario K1H 2R7, Canada
- Department of Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
- Department of Epidemiology & Community Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa
- Corresponding author. Tel.: 613-738-3591.

Accepted 30 August 2004. published online 03 June 2005.

Abstract

Objective

To compare the quality of reporting of reports randomized controlled trials (RCTs) published in English and in languages other than English (LOE), and to determine whether there were differences between conventional medicine (CM) and complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) reports.

Study Design and Setting

We examined more than 600 RCTs associated with 125 systematic reviews. We extracted characteristics of each RCT using a standardized data collection form. We assessed quality using the Jadad scale and the adequacy of allocation concealment.

Results

There were only minor differences in the quality of reports of RCTs published in English compared with other languages (median quality score of 3 vs. 2, P=.10), and the quality of reports of CAM RCTs was similar to the CM reports (median score of 3 vs. 2, P=.14). There was no effect of language of publication on quality of reporting for CM trials (median score of 2 vs. 2, P=.12). Among CAM trials, however, overall quality scores were higher for reports in English than for reports in other languages (median score of 3 vs. 2, P=.04).

Conclusion

The overall quality of reports published in languages other than English is similar to that of English-language reports. Moreover, the overall quality of reporting of RCTs of CAM interventions is as good as that for CM interventions.

Keywords: Quality, Reporting, Randomized trials, Complementary therapies, Alternative medicine, Traditional medicine