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[Evidence-based medicine in Spanish pediatric surgery reports]
Introduction:
Pediatric surgical literature is characterized by a high prevalence of observational studies and a paucity of randomized controlled trial, comparing mainly medical therapies.
Aims:
To asses scientific evidence level produced by spanish pediatric surgeons.
Material And Methods:
Articles reported in Cirugía Pediátrica, surgical reports in Anales Españoles de Pediatría, and reports from spanish authors published in the Journal of Pediatric Surgery, Pediatric Surgery International and European Journal of Pediatric Surgery, from 1997 to 2002. Internal validity was assessed through the critial guides from Sackett, and evidence level was classified through the Oxford Centre for Evidence Based Medicine classification.
Results:
94.5% on therapy reports, 61.5% on diagnosis, 83.3% on prognosis and 52.2% on risk factors or etiology, were classified as level 4 (descriptive studies). Only four randomized controlled trials were found, all of them comparing medical therapies (analgesia, antibiotics and surgical stress control).
Conclusions:
Our results are similar to those offered by previous reviews, showing up a low level of scientific evidence in most articles. Diffusion of guides on reporting descriptive studies may improve the evidence level of our reports.
