Department of Health Research Methods, Evidence and Impact, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
Department of Health Research Methods, Evidence and Impact, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
J Clin Epidemiol. 2020 Jun;122:108-114. doi: 10.1016/j.jclinepi.2020.01.019. Epub 2020 Feb 15.
Surveys can inform important health care questions. However, should decision-makers believe strong conclusions that authors of surveys report? Objectives of this systematic survey of surveys are to describe the characteristics and conduct of surveys and investigate the association of the conduct with the conclusions.
We randomly selected 180 surveys published over 1 year in core clinical journals that included a self-report instrument to elicit knowledge, attitudes, behaviors, and experiences regarding health. Study selection and abstraction was independent and in duplicate. We calculated frequencies of descriptive data. We conducted multivariable logistic regression analyses to assess the association of strong or weak conclusions with survey methods.
Our results suggest that authors who validate questions in their survey make strong conclusions. We found that strong conclusions may not be associated with response rates or number of respondents. However, it did not appear that journal impact factor was related to strong conclusions.
Our results suggest that users of surveys should not rely on the conclusions of authors. A critical appraisal tool for users of surveys and guidance for authors about factors to consider when making conclusions would be helpful.
调查可以为重要的医疗保健问题提供信息。然而，决策者是否应该相信调查作者报告的有力结论？本系统调查的目的是描述调查的特征和进行情况，并研究进行情况与结论之间的关系。
我们随机选择了 180 篇在核心临床期刊上发表的、涵盖了自我报告工具的调查，这些工具用于收集有关健康的知识、态度、行为和经验。研究选择和抽象是独立和重复的。我们计算了描述性数据的频率。我们进行了多变量逻辑回归分析，以评估有力或无力结论与调查方法的关系。
我们的结果表明，在调查中验证问题的作者会得出有力的结论。我们发现，有力的结论可能与应答率或应答者人数无关。然而，似乎期刊影响因子与有力的结论无关。
我们的结果表明，调查使用者不应依赖作者的结论。为调查使用者提供一个批判性评估工具，并为作者提供在做出结论时应考虑的因素的指导，将是有帮助的。
