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©The Author(s) 2015. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Meta-Anal. Jun 26, 2015; 3(3): 139-141
Published online Jun 26, 2015. doi: 10.13105/wjma.v3.i3.139
Published online Jun 26, 2015. doi: 10.13105/wjma.v3.i3.139
Systematic reviews and meta-analyses: Why are they clinically significant?
Xing-Shun Qi, Zhi-Ping Yang, Ming Bai, Evidence-Based Medicine Group, Xijing Hospital of Digestive Diseases, Fourth Military Medical University, Xi’an 710000, Shaanxi Province, China
Xing-Shun Qi, Department of Gastroenterology, General Hospital of Shenyang Military Area, Shenyang 110840, Liaoning Province, China
Ming Bai, Department of Nephrology, Xijing Hospital, Fourth Military Medical University, Xi’an 710000, Shaanxi Province, China
Yong-Ji Wang, Medical Department, 309th Hospital of Chinese People’s Liberation Army, Beijing 100000, China
Yong-Ji Wang, Department of Health Statistics, Fourth Military Medical University, Xi’an 710000, Shaanxi Province, China
Author contributions: Qi XS conceived this work and drafted the manuscript; Yang ZP, Bai M and Wang YJ gave critical comments and revised the manuscript; all the authors have made an intellectual contribution to the manuscript and approved the submission.
Conflict-of-interest: All authors disclosed no conflicts of interest regarding this work.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Dr. Xing-Shun Qi, Department of Gastroenterology, General Hospital of Shenyang Military Area, 83 WenHua Road, Shenhe District, Shenyang 110840, Liaoning Province, China. xingshunqi@126.com
Telephone: +86-24-28851113
Received: January 7, 2015
Peer-review started: January 8, 2015
First decision: February 7, 2015
Revised: February 24, 2015
Accepted: May 26, 2015
Article in press: May 27, 2015
Published online: June 26, 2015
Processing time: 173 Days and 18.7 Hours
Peer-review started: January 8, 2015
First decision: February 7, 2015
Revised: February 24, 2015
Accepted: May 26, 2015
Article in press: May 27, 2015
Published online: June 26, 2015
Processing time: 173 Days and 18.7 Hours
Core Tip
Core tip: Systematic reviews and meta-analyses are very important for clinicians and investigators because they can provide the highest level of evidence for clinical decisions, propose unresolved issues and future directions, avoid harm to the human body and prevent a waste of resources.