Costing vascular surgery: A review of current reporting practice

The objective of this study was to assess the level of reporting in economic studies in the area of peripheral vascular disease. Adequate reporting of data is necessary to judge the quality of economic studies by means of critical appraisal criteria.

A systematic review of the journal literature between 1986 and the first half of 1997 was undertaken. Studies that have attempted to estimate the resource consequences of one or more vascular procedure were the focus of the review. The extent of reporting in each study was assessed by using published guidelines.

The review identified 30 articles from nine different countries for inclusion in the study. Of these, more than half were published in the last 2(1/2) years of the search period, indicating a recent and rapid growth in economic studies in this area. When subjected to the reporting guidelines, the studies performed rather poorly overall.

Although the vascular studies can be criticized for inadequate reporting of economic data, it appears from the limited evidence from elsewhere that inadequate reporting is a problem in other clinical areas. In view of the importance of reporting to the ability to critically assess studies-and thus separate the "good" from the "bad"-there is a need for reporting to improve future published studies.