Ulusakarya 2000.
| Study characteristics | |||
| Patient sampling | Consecutive series of patients; retrospectively selected | ||
| Patient characteristics and setting | 507 samples from 135 patients were analysed during 193 neutropenic periods Age ranged from 6 to 78 years; 47% males Haematology unit France Children and adults undergoing bone marrow transplantation (BMT); all consecutive patients with haematological malignancies and treated with high‐dose chemotherapy Monitoring clinical course |
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| Index tests | Platelia Antigenaemia was monitored weekly Positive = one or more positives; negative = all negatives Cut‐off: 1.0 and 1.5 reported |
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| Target condition and reference standard(s) | Invasive aspergillosis, as defined by EORTC‐like criteria, citation Machetti 1998. Proven + probable + possible versus no IA Galactomannan ELISA was not mentioned as part of the reference criteria |
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| Flow and timing | Not clear if all patients were categorised according to the same criteria Withdrawals were explained Uninterpretable results reported: these were ignored | ||
| Comparative | |||
| No patients per category | 10 proven, 6 probable, 2 possible, 117 no IA | ||
| Notes | Nothing reported about financing | ||
| Methodological quality | |||
| Item | Authors' judgement | Risk of bias | Applicability concerns |
| DOMAIN 1: Patient Selection | |||
| Was a consecutive or random sample of patients enrolled? | Yes | ||
| Was a case‐control design avoided? | Yes | ||
| Did the study avoid inappropriate exclusions? | Yes | ||
| Low | Low | ||
| DOMAIN 2: Index Test All tests | |||
| Were the index test results interpreted without knowledge of the results of the reference standard? | Unclear | ||
| If a threshold was used, was it pre‐specified? | Yes | ||
| Unclear | Low | ||
| DOMAIN 3: Reference Standard | |||
| Is the reference standards likely to correctly classify the target condition? | Yes | ||
| Were the reference standard results interpreted without knowledge of the results of the index tests? | Unclear | ||
| Unclear | Unclear | ||
| DOMAIN 4: Flow and Timing | |||
| Was there an appropriate interval between index test and reference standard? | Yes | ||
| Did all patients receive the same reference standard? | Yes | ||
| Were all patients included in the analysis? | Yes | ||
| Low | |||