Missing data reporting in clinical pharmacy research.
Purpose This study aimed to document the ways by which missing data were handled in clinical pharmacy research to provide an insight into the amount of attention paid to the importance of missing data in this field of research. Methods Our cross-sectional descriptive report evaluated 10 journals aff...
| Published in: | American Journal of Health-System Pharmacy Vol. 76; no. 24; pp. 2048 - 2053 |
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| Main Authors: | , , , , , , |
| Format: | research tables/charts Journal Article |
| Published: |
Oxford University Press / USA
12/15/2019
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| Online Access: | View this record in EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ccm&AN=140089888&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: ccm uiTerm: 140089888 longDbName: CINAHL Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: dissinfo: jinfo: jid: 10792082 1X3 jtl: American Journal of Health-System Pharmacy issn: 10792082 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: 12/15/2019 vid: 76 iid: 24 pid: 622 pub: Oxford University Press / USA artinfo: ui: 140089888 140089888 140089888 10.1093/ajhp/zxz245 140089888 ppf: 2048 ppct: 5 formats: fmt: – @attributes: type: T – @attributes: type: P tig: atl: Missing data reporting in clinical pharmacy research. aug: au: Narayan, Sujita W Ho, Kar Yu Penm, Jonathan Mintzes, Barbara Mirzaei, Ardalan Schneider, Carl Patanwala, Asad E affil: School of Pharmacy, Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia sug: subj: Data Management Documentation Pharmacy Service Research, Medical Human Cross Sectional Studies Descriptive Research Professional Organizations United States Canada United Kingdom Australia ab: Purpose This study aimed to document the ways by which missing data were handled in clinical pharmacy research to provide an insight into the amount of attention paid to the importance of missing data in this field of research. Methods Our cross-sectional descriptive report evaluated 10 journals affiliated with pharmacy organizations in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Australia. Randomized controlled trials, cohort studies, case-control studies, and cross-sectional studies published in 2018 were included. The primary outcome measure was the proportion of studies that reported the handling of missing data in their methods or results. Results A total of 178 studies were included in the analysis. Of these, 19.7% (n = 35) mentioned missing data either in their methods (3.4%, n = 6), results (15.2%, n = 27), or in both sections (1.1%, n = 2). Only 4.5% (n = 8) of the studies mentioned how they handled missing data, the most common method being multiple imputation (n = 3), followed by indicator (n = 2), complete case analysis (n = 2), and simple imputation (n = 1). One study using multiple imputation and both studies using an indicator method also combined other strategies to account for missing data. One study only used complete case analysis for subgroup analysis, and the other study only used this method if a specific baseline variable was missing. Conclusions Very few studies in clinical pharmacy literature report any handling of missing data. This has the potential to lead to biased results. We advocate that researchers should report how missing data were handled to increase the transparency of findings and minimize bias. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: research tables/charts Journal Article ougenre: Article language: English refInfo: holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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