PROTOCOL: Systematic review of methods to reduce risk of bias in knowledge translation interventional studies in health-related issues.

BACKGROUND

Review studies have reported on the low quality of study methodologies and poor reporting of knowledge translation (KT) interventional studies. This flaw cause the result of such studies to become misleading.

OBJECTIVES

The present review is designed to evaluate the effect of methodological factors on the results of interventional studies that aimed to evaluate KT strategies at the policy level.

SEARCH METHODS

Bibliographic databases and grey literature databases will be searched. The retrieved studies will be recorded in Covidence. After screening titles and abstracts, the full texts of selected studies will be assessed against the inclusion criteria. Disagreements will be resolved through discussion or by consultation with a third author.

SELECTION CRITERIA

Primary studies are studies that aimed to estimate the efficacy of KT strategies to improve evidence-informed policymaking. Study participants include policymakers and the intervention is a KT strategy. The main outcome is the desired changes in policy-makers towards evidence-informed decision-making.

DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS

The main effect sizes will be expressed as standard mean difference and its variance for the main efficacy outcome of KT strategies in primary studies. Forest plot meta-analysis will be used to synthesize the effect of each group of KT strategies. The contribution of ROB to the efficacy of KT interventions will be assessed via Meta-epidemiology analysis. The overall estimate will be calculated using inverse-variance random-effects meta-analysis with a 95% confidence interval for the estimate.