Objective To learn the current situation of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) systematic reviews/meta-analyses published in Chinese journals. Methods All TCM systematic reviews/meta-analyses published from 1978 to July 31, 2009 were searched in the Chinese Biomedical Database (CBM). According to the inclusion and exclusion criteria, relevant information was extracted on the basis of research purpose. Meanwhile, publication year, journal name, author’s district, number of authors and their articles, types of diseases and interventions were took as the indexes, and then descriptive analysis was performed using SPSS 15.0 software. Results A total of 245 articles including 238 in Chinese and 7 in English were included. All of them were published in 117 different journals from 1998 to 2008, showing an accelerating growth trend of article number. In addition to only one article with first author from Germany, the first author of other 244 were from 24 domestic provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities); the number of authors ranged from 1 to 11; a total of 186 people had published articles as first author, and the number of their published articles ranged from 1 to 29. There were 16 types of diseases according to the International Classification of Diseases 10th Edition (ICD-10). Totally, 218 articles took drugs as interventions (including 106 listed drugs, 25 self-made prescriptions, 70 related to both listed drugs and self-made prescriptions, and 17 without reporting detailed interventions), accounting for 89%; and 27 articles were about non-drug interventions (including 26 about acupuncture and 1 about massage), accounting for 11%. Most (95.8%) of the articles about self-made prescriptions and listed drugs/self-made prescriptions adopted inappropriate pooled analyses. Conclusion Evidence-based medicine has been spread into the field of TCM, the number of TCM systematic reviews/meta-analyses shows an accelerated growth trend. The types of diseases discussed in the literature were almost the same as the diseases those could be effectively treated by TCM, but there existed imbalance in districts. In the future, systematic review/meta-analysis on drug intervention should aim at Chinese patent medicines and single medicines rather than self-made prescriptions, and should pay more attention to advantageous drugs and advantageous treatments of diseases. Moreover, importance should be also attached to clinical heterogeneity controlling when using acupuncture as a non-drug intervention.
ObjectiveTo access the current study status and the existing problems of studies on National Essential Medicines System (NEMS) in China based on systematic review methods, and provide the evidence-based evidence and references to the studies of this field. MethodsThe following databases such as PubMed, EMbase, The Cochrane Library (Issue 3, March 2014), CNKI, WanFang Data, VIP and CBM were electronically searched to collect studies related to the policy analysis, implementation background, implementation strategies, implementation situation, implementation problem and implementation effects about NEMS in China. The retrieval time was from inception to December 2013. Two reviewers independently screened literature according to the inclusion and exclusion criteria, extracted data, and finally conducted analysis on study types, study time, source journals, authors' units, study themes, etc. of the included studies. ResultsA total of 1 607 articles were finally included, encompassing 56.38% qualitative studies and 43.62% quantitative studies. The number of published studies per year, the number of quantitative studies as well as the number of financiallysupported studies out of the total studies published per year had increased by year since 2009. The study topics focused on every parts during the implementation of NEMS in different proportions. The proportion of the national studies in the quantitative studies was lower than that of others. The regional distribution involved in the quantitative studies was unbalanced, and the ratio of which located on the East, the Central and the West of China was 2 to 1 to 1. ConclusionThe implementation of NEMS and related studies are mutually promoted. More studies are needed to be carried out on remote areas as well as West China. Although the studies related to these areas tend to be standardized and evidence-based, but more in-depth studies should be well advanced. Most of the topics of the studies are widely covered, and the topics of further studies should be enforced in the detail of implementation links. Most of the studies focus on primary medical institutions, and more studies are also needed for supporting and expanding the implementation of NEMS in second and three degree medical institutions.
ObjectiveTo analyze the status of systematic reviews/meta-analyses on tuberculosis. MethodsThe Web of Science was searched for systematic reviews/meta-analyses on tuberculosis up to February 4th, 2015. According to the inclusion and exclusion criteria, two reviewers screened literature and extracted data. Then SPSS 11.0 software was used to analysis data including publication year, country, institution, journal and citation situation. ResultsA total of 461 systematic reviews/meta-analyses were included. The publication numbers was increasing from 1 in 1997 to 82 in 2014. Among them, China ranked the top country (113 studies), followed by the USA and Canada. The area with the most number of countries where studies were published was Europe, followed by Asia and Africa. In terms of institution, McGill University in Canada ranked the top, followed by University of London in England and Sichuan University in China. As for the number of papers in journals, the International Journal of Tuberculosis and Lung Disease ranked the top, followed by PLOS One and European Respiratory Journal. In the terms of citation, the citation ranged from 0 to 591, and the median citation frequency was 8. ConclusionThe systematic reviews/meta-analyses on tuberculosis is gradually increasing; the developed countries are still important output areas; and China is playing more and more important role in this research field.
ObjectiveTo survey the important characteristics, such as the number of time cited, methodological and reporting quality of the systematic review/meta-analysis (SR/MA) of animal studies published in Chinese journals. MethodsThe CNKI and WanFang Data databases were searched for SR/MA of animal studies published in Chinese journals from inception to March 2014. Two reviewers independently screened literature according to the inclusion and exclusion criteria, extracted basic characteristic and methodology characteristics of included studies. And then a descriptive analysis was conducted. ResultsA total of 18 studies published in 13 different journals were included. 77.8% studies were not been cited, 44.4% did not report the types of including studies. Besides, there were some certain weaknesses in the methodological quality, for example, over 60% studies did not assess the qualities and publication bias of the including studies, 22.2% SRs/MAs only searched Chinese databases, over 80% studies did not provide flow chart etc. ConclusionThe number of SRs/MAs of animal studies published in Chinese journals is small and the number of times cited is low, and the methodological and reporting quality is poor. So, focusing on improving the quality of SRs/MAs is urgently needed in order to increase the value of these studies.
Objective To investigate the employment situation of optometry students from medical colleges 5-10 years after graduation to provide suggestions on construction and development of optometry. Methods Between July and November 2015, a electronic questionnaire survey was conducted among 100 optometry students graduated from West China Hospital of Sichuan University(from 55 students) and China Medical University (from 84 students) 5-10 years ago. The questionnaire items included: the employer at the graduation, the current employer, whether changing job, whether diverting to other professions, job satisfaction extent, situation of continuing education, and advice on optometry education and optometry professional development. Results Sixty-three graduates gave back valid questionnaire. After graduation, 61 graduates (96.8%) engaged in in the optometry profession, and 2 (3.2%) diverted to other professions. Five to ten years after graduation, 57 graduates (90.5%) engaged in the optometry profession, and 6 (9.5%) diverted to other professions. The job satisfaction of 52 graduates (82.5%) was good. Conclusions Under the circumstances of severe shortage of professional optical talents, optometry students from medical colleges should fully understand their own profession, make good psychological adjustment on employment and good phased career plan, and continue to strengthen the knowledge, to solve the present situation of the lack of the highly educated optical professionals.
ObjectivesTo survey the current research situation, methodological and reporting quality of the systematic review/meta-analysis (SRs/MAs) of animal studies.MethodsPubMed, EMbase, BIOSIS Previews, CNKI, WanFang Data, CBM and VIP databases were searched to collect SRs/MAs of animal studies from inception to June 2016. Two reviewers independently screened literature, extracted data, a descriptive analysis was then conducted.ResultsA total of 609 SRs/MAs of animal studies were included, which were from 27 countries and published in 526 journals. Merely 36.8% (224/609) studies assessed the risk of bias in the original animal experiments. Less than 50% studies reported the method of literature selection (41.9%, 255/609), data abstraction (32.0%, 195/609) and study characteristics (41.2%, 251/609).ConclusionsThe published SRs/MAs of animal studies is poor in both methodological and reporting quality. Thus, we hope to improve awareness and actual use rates of these guidelines by basic medical researchers and journal editors, thereby improving the quality of animal experimental methods and reporting standards.
ObjectivesTo survey the domestic research situation of evidence-based education through visual studies. To summarize the utilization of education evidence in China and promote the process of evidence-based practice concepts and methods application in social science fields, so as to facilitate the domestic evidence-based research towards more scientific and practical. Methods WanFang Data and CNKI databases were searched to collect evidence-based education literatures from inception to December, 2017. Tableau and UCINET software were used to conduct visual and co-word analysis of study types, regions, staff, time, foundation/government support and key words. The social evidence based research situation was sketched. Results A total of 54 literatures were included. Beijing and Guangdong province published the most literatures, followed by Zhejiang province and Tianjin municipality. The quantity of literatures published in 2014 reached the peak of 11 articles, followed by 2016 and 2017, and relatively few in remaining years. We found that " evidence-based pedagogy” owned the highest frequency through building core keywords matrix. Conclusions Evidence-based education in China is still at an early stage. Introduction and promotion is currently the main content. There exists problems remaining in the development of evidence-based education, for instance disjointedness of theory and practice, regional unbalance, and deficiency of original-research. It is still a long way to go.