Ninth Biannual Report of the Cochrane Haematological Malignancies Group—Focus on Hematopoietic Growth Factors

Extract

Introduction

This ninth biannual report of the Cochrane Haematological Malignancies Group (CHMG) highlights recently published randomized controlled trials (RCTs) that were identified through the MEDLINE database in the field of hemato-oncology.

Implication for clinical practice and methodological aspects are the main principles for selecting trials for this report. RCTs were identified through electronic search of MEDLINE using a broad search filter that covers all topics in hemato-oncology combined with a highly sensitive search filter for randomized studies (Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions). An electron search of the Ovid MEDLINE database (http://gateway.ut.ovid.com) was undertaken on August 26, 2008. In this present summary of key features of recent RCTs, we focus on hematopoietic growth factors. From 1790 identified studies (RCTs and nonrandomized clinical trials), five RCTs were selected and are presented in detail. The publication period from December 2007 to July 2008 is covered within this report.

After a short overview of the clinical relevance and the selection of patients for these trials, we discuss important methodological aspects of each trial, for example, randomization, loss to follow-up, and statistical analysis. We also discuss the results of the primary efficacy endpoints and safety analysis. The main objective of this summary report is to provide the knowledge in a way that busy practitioners can easily interpret it.