ObjectiveTo investigate the citation status of systematic reviews on imaging diagnosis in clinical practice guidelines (CPGs) and provide reference for the development of Chinese imaging diagnosis guidelines. MethodsWe electronically searched PubMed databases to collect systematic reviews on imaging diagnosis. The date was limited from January 1st 2010 to December 31th 2012. Two reviewers independently screened literature and extracted data. The citation data of included systematic reviews were obtained on the Web of Science. Citation analysis method was used to analyze the citation frequency of systematic reviews on imaging diagnosis in CPGs. Results292 systematic reviews on imaging diagnosis were included, of which 94% (275/292) were indexed by Science Citation Index. The total citation frequency of these systematic reviews was 5413 (medium:20, range:0 to 131). 28% (78/275) were cited by CPGs. Of which, 7% (19/275) were used as the source of the evidence of recommendations in CPGs. ConclusionThe ratio of systematic reviews cited by CPGs is low, the ratio of being the source of evidence of recommendations of systematic reviews in CPGs is lower, and furthermore, the citation is time-delayed.
ObjectiveTo investigate the recommendations on imaging diagnosis in Chinese clinical practice guidelines (CPGs). MethodsWe electronically searched WanFang Data, VIP, CNKI and CBM databases from inception to December 31, 2014. Two reviewers independently screened literature and extracted data. The method of bibliometrics was used to analyze the data (including basic characteristics, strength of recommendation, quality of evidence, etc.). ResultsA total of 341 CPGs formulating the recommendations on diagnosis were included. 48.7% (166/341) guidelines developed the recommendations on imaging diagnosis (a total of 534). 25.7% (137/534) recommendations were with the symbols of quality of evidence and strength of recommendation, and 18.9% (101/534) with special words such as recommend, suggest. 22.3% (119/534) recommendations reported the strength of recommendation. Of which, 38.7% (46/119) were strong and 16.0% (19/119) were weak. However, 23.9% (11/46) strong recommendations were based on low quality of evidence. And 42.1% (8/19) weak recommendations were based on high quality of evidence. ConclusionAmong Chinese CPGs formulating the recommendations on diagnosis, the number of CPGs with recommendations on imaging is about 50%. And the quantity increases by years. The proportions of recommendations on imaging which report the strength of recommendation and/or quality of evidence are low. Meanwhile, the rating systems are uniform. Then the developers do not report the explanation for the strong recommendations based on low quality of evidence or the weak recommendations based on high quality of evidence in guideline.