How long does it take to complete and publish a systematic review of animal studies?

IF 3.4 3区医学 Q1 HEALTH CARE SCIENCES & SERVICES

BMC Medical Research Methodology Pub Date : 2025-10-01 DOI:10.1186/s12874-025-02672-5

Julia Victoria Bugajska, Bernard Friedrich Hild, David Brüschweiler, Enrico Daniele Meier, Alexandra Bannach-Brown, Kimberley Elaine Wever, Benjamin Victor Ineichen

{"title":"How long does it take to complete and publish a systematic review of animal studies?","authors":"Julia Victoria Bugajska, Bernard Friedrich Hild, David Brüschweiler, Enrico Daniele Meier, Alexandra Bannach-Brown, Kimberley Elaine Wever, Benjamin Victor Ineichen","doi":"10.1186/s12874-025-02672-5","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Introduction: Conducting a rigorous systematic review of animal studies requires a priori registration of a study protocol. However, it remains unknown how many of these registered studies culminate in publication and how long it takes to complete such a systematic review. Thus, this study had two objectives: (1) to assess the proportion of registered protocols that result in publication, and (2) to determine the time required to complete and publish systematic reviews of animal studies after protocol registration.Methods: All available systematic reviews protocols of animal study were manually downloaded from PROSPERO, the international registry of systematic review protocols. Start and completion date as well as topical and demographic data were extracted, complemented by a web-scraping approach. Assessment of publication status was achieved through a systematic literature search.Results: From a total of 1,771 protocols, 406 were excluded due to recent start dates. This left 1,365 protocols eligible for the final analysis. Among these, 694 (51%) resulted in a published systematic review. Median time to complete and publish a systematic review was 11.5 months (range: 0.13-44.9 months) and 16.2 months (range: 1.0-49.7 months), respectively. This time was 69% more until submission than anticipated by the authors (6.8 months [range: 0.9-48.0]).Conclusion: Only half of registered protocols resulted in publication, suggesting possible publication bias. Authors can expect to complete and publish an animal systematic review within approximately one year.","PeriodicalId":9114,"journal":{"name":"BMC Medical Research Methodology","volume":"25 1","pages":"226"},"PeriodicalIF":3.4000,"publicationDate":"2025-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12487012/pdf/","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"BMC Medical Research Methodology","FirstCategoryId":"3","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1186/s12874-025-02672-5","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"HEALTH CARE SCIENCES & SERVICES","Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Abstract

Introduction: Conducting a rigorous systematic review of animal studies requires a priori registration of a study protocol. However, it remains unknown how many of these registered studies culminate in publication and how long it takes to complete such a systematic review. Thus, this study had two objectives: (1) to assess the proportion of registered protocols that result in publication, and (2) to determine the time required to complete and publish systematic reviews of animal studies after protocol registration.

Methods: All available systematic reviews protocols of animal study were manually downloaded from PROSPERO, the international registry of systematic review protocols. Start and completion date as well as topical and demographic data were extracted, complemented by a web-scraping approach. Assessment of publication status was achieved through a systematic literature search.

Results: From a total of 1,771 protocols, 406 were excluded due to recent start dates. This left 1,365 protocols eligible for the final analysis. Among these, 694 (51%) resulted in a published systematic review. Median time to complete and publish a systematic review was 11.5 months (range: 0.13-44.9 months) and 16.2 months (range: 1.0-49.7 months), respectively. This time was 69% more until submission than anticipated by the authors (6.8 months [range: 0.9-48.0]).

Conclusion: Only half of registered protocols resulted in publication, suggesting possible publication bias. Authors can expect to complete and publish an animal systematic review within approximately one year.

Abstract Image

查看原文本刊更多论文

完成并发表一篇动物研究的系统综述需要多长时间？

对动物研究进行严格的系统审查需要对研究方案进行先验注册。然而，目前尚不清楚这些已注册的研究中有多少最终发表，以及完成这样的系统综述需要多长时间。因此，本研究有两个目标：(1)评估已注册方案最终发表的比例；(2)确定方案注册后完成并发表动物研究系统综述所需的时间。方法：从国际系统评价方案注册库PROSPERO手动下载所有可用的动物研究系统评价方案。开始和完成日期以及专题和人口统计数据被提取，辅以网络抓取方法。通过系统的文献检索来评估出版状况。结果：在总共1771个方案中，406个由于最近的开始日期而被排除。这使得1365个方案有资格进行最终分析。其中，694篇（51%）发表了系统评价。完成和发表系统评价的中位时间分别为11.5个月（范围：0.13-44.9个月）和16.2个月（范围：1.0-49.7个月）。这比作者预期的提交时间多了69%（6.8个月[范围：0.9-48.0]）。结论：只有一半的注册方案发表，提示可能存在发表偏倚。作者可以期望在大约一年内完成并发表一篇动物系统综述。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

求助全文

约1分钟内获得全文求助全文

来源期刊

BMC Medical Research Methodology 医学-卫生保健

CiteScore

6.50

自引率

2.50%

发文量

298

审稿时长

3-8 weeks

期刊介绍： BMC Medical Research Methodology is an open access journal publishing original peer-reviewed research articles in methodological approaches to healthcare research. Articles on the methodology of epidemiological research, clinical trials and meta-analysis/systematic review are particularly encouraged, as are empirical studies of the associations between choice of methodology and study outcomes. BMC Medical Research Methodology does not aim to publish articles describing scientific methods or techniques: these should be directed to the BMC journal covering the relevant biomedical subject area.