[German language articles on controlled trials in oral and maxillofacial surgery]

Various authors have shown that only a part of all reports of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and controlled clinical trials (CCTs) are accessible in Medline. However, the validity of systematic reviews and meta-analyses heavily depends on the completeness of the identified studies published for a particular clinical problem. Therefore, an additional manual search in dental/medical journals is often indispensable. The major purpose of the present article was to identify all published reports of RCTs and CCTs dealing with topics covered by the discipline oral and maxillofacial surgery. The journals Deutsche Zahnärztliche Zeitschrift, Schwetzer Monatsschrift für Zahnmedizin, Mund-, Kiefer- und Gesichtschirurgie, Stomatologie, and Stomatologie der DDR were manually searched. The publication type of the identified clinical trial reports was determined and compared with Medline. Among the 14,860 articles perused, 202 RCTs and 396 CCTs were identified. 74 RCTs (36.6%) and 104 CCTs (26.2%) referred to topics related to oral and maxillofacial surgery. Of the 74 RCT reports, 44 are included in Medline, and 14 are indexed with the correct publication type term. The majority of RCTs were carried out in the field of oral and maxillofacial surgery. Unfortunately, only a part of German-language reports of dental clinical trials are accessible in Medline. Therefore, a literature search restricted to this database is likely to be incomplete, possibly leading to biased results.