Abstract
Objectives
To review the reporting of key items of recruitment information in trial reports and
estimate the number needed to screen to recruit one additional participant.
Study Design and Setting
Review of breast cancer trials published in the years 2003–2005, 2007, and 2008.
Results
The search identified 1,570 potentially eligible studies. After a random selection
of 20% from each year and checking against inclusion criteria, a total of 207 studies
were included in the review. Some items of information were well reported, such as
the number included in the analysis. Sample size calculations were often not presented,
but reporting is slowly improving. Who recruits participants and how many individuals
were screened are often not reported. The median number needed to screen to recruit
one additional participant was two (range, 1–593).
Conclusions
Without reporting the when, where, by whom, and how many of recruitment, trialists
deny readers part of the contextual description they need to judge whether a trial’s
results are applicable to their own situation. Trialists and journal editors need
to be more diligent in following the reporting recommendations of the Consolidated
Standards of Reporting Trials statement.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: April 25, 2011
Accepted:
January 28,
2011
Footnotes
Conflict of interest: Both authors declare no conflict of interest.
Identification
Copyright
© 2011 Elsevier Inc. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
