Featured review: Is exercise an effective therapy to treat long ‐lasting low back pain?

In this interview with Jill Hayden we learn how this review, one of Cochrane ’s largest reviews published to date, has led to new ways of working collaboratively and with an increased focus on research integrity. An ongoing update of this review will bring five related Cochrane reviews together into one. You have just completed theCochrane review of Exercise treatment for chronic low back pain. How is this Cochrane review different to others you ’ve worked on?The size of this review made it quite different from other systematic reviews that I have contributed to, with 249 included trials. The review was challenging and took several years to complete because of the number of trials. As with most teams conducting systematic reviews, we had limited funding available to support this research, so it was difficult to complete the review with numerous new eligible trials being published on the topic each year.However, a benefit of a review this size is the ability to explore study features – we were able to conduct analyses and identify issues that would not have been possible in smaller, focused reviews.The review also allowed us to reflect on issues of research waste, duplication of effort and more efficient evidence production. For example, we observed several smaller systematic reviews published on the same topic while we were working hard assessing and synthesizing the exact same trials. With these challenges and observations, we have proposed a new collaborative model o...
Source: Cochrane News and Events - Category: Information Technology Authors: Source Type: news