These manuscripts are systematic, critical assessments of literature and data sources on clinical topics, focused on specific aspects like cause, diagnosis, therapy, prognosis, or prevention.

Subtitle should include “A Meta-analysis”.

All articles or data sources should be searched for and selected systematically for inclusion and critically evaluated. The search and selection process of the studies included should be described in the Material & Methods section.

The data sources should be as recent as possible, ideally with the search having been conducted within several months of manuscript submission.

The results of multiple studies that measure the same outcome into a single pooled estimate are quantitatively combined by a statistical analysis.

Structure:

  1. Abstract (max 300 words)
  2. Introduction
  3. Material & Methods
  4. Results
  5. Discussion
  6. Conclusion(s)
  7. List of Abbreviations
  8. Statements
  9. References

PRISMA guidelines are recommended for meta-analyses of clinical trials

MOOSE checklist are recommended for meta-analyses of observational studies

For more details for each section you can read the Original Research structure suggestions.

Format

  • Word limit: 4000 (Abstract not included)
  • Reference maximum: 75
  • Figures or tables limit: 5