Table 1.
Principal characteristics of included articles using QA tools in vitro SRs/MAs
| Characteristics | Categorization | All studies (N = 244) |
|---|---|---|
| Year of publication | 2007–2014 | 24 (9.8%) |
| 2015–2020 | 220 (90.2%) | |
| Region | Europe | 99 (40.6%) |
| South-America | 64 (26.2%) | |
| Asia | 33 (13.5%) | |
| Middle East | 26 (10.7%) | |
| North America | 14 (5.7%) | |
| Australia | 5 (2%) | |
| Africa | 3 (1.2%) | |
| Study topic | Dentistry | 125 (51.2%) |
| Bioactivity | 53 (21.7%) | |
| Biology | 31 (12.7%) | |
| Methodology | 13 (5.3%) | |
| Materials | 9 (3.7%) | |
| Pharmacology | 5 (2%) | |
| Diagnosis | 4 (1.6%) | |
| Toxicity | 4 (1.6%) | |
| Reporting QA used | PRISMA | 143 (58.6%) |
| N | 93 (38.1%) | |
| PRISMA and AMSTAR | 3 (1.3%) | |
| Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions | 2 (0.8%) | |
| STROBE | 1 (0.4%) | |
| QUOROM | 1 (0.4%) | |
| OHAT | 1 (0.4%) | |
| QA used | Y | 126 (51.6%) |
| N | 118 (48.4%) | |
| Conducting meta-analysis | Y | 71 (29.1%) |
| N | 173 (70.9%) | |
| QA tool used | NR | 120 (49.2%) |
| Following previous description of Onofre et al. | 29 (11.9%) | |
| Developed by authors | 28 (11.5%) | |
| Cochrane Risk of Bias tool | 12 (4.9%) | |
| CONSORT | 8 (3.3%) | |
| ToxRTool | 5 (2%) | |
| OHAT | 4 (1.6%) | |
| Joanna Briggs Institute Clinical Appraisal Checklist | 4 (1.6%) | |
| MINORS | 4 (1.6%) | |
| QUADAS-2 | 4 (1.6%) | |
| GRADE | 3 (1.2%) | |
| NOS | 3 (1.2%) | |
| Following previous description of Onofre et al. and Montagner et al. | 2 (0.8%) | |
| STROBE | 2 (0.8%) | |
| Following the previous description of Bader et al | 1 (0.4%) | |
| Following previous description of Sackett et al | 1 (0.4%) | |
| JADAD | 1 (0.4%) | |
| SciRAP method | 1 (0.4%) | |
| CASP and MINORS | 1 (0.4%) | |
| Timmer’s Analysis Tool | 1 (0.4%) | |
| ARRIVE | 1 (0.4%) | |
| QUADAS | 1 (0.4%) | |
| Modifying Quality Assessment Tool for Studies with Diverse Designs (QATSDD) | 1 (0.4%) | |
| Referencing CRH and the EBM Evidence Pyramid | 1 (0.4%) | |
| Nature Publication Quality Improvement Project (NPQIP) study | 1 (0.4%) | |
| Standard Quality Assessment Criteria for Evaluating Primary Research Papers from a Variety of Fields | 1 (0.4%) | |
| Following previous description of Samuel et al. | 1 (0.4%) | |
| SYCLE | 1 (0.4%) | |
| World Cancer Research Fund/ University of Bristol for cell line | 1 (0.4%) | |
| CRIS guidelines | 1 (0.4%) | |
| Following Joanna Briggs Institute Clinical Appraisal Checklist for Experimental Studies | 1 (0.4%) | |
| PRISMA | 1 (0.4%) | |
| Downs and Black | 1 (0.4%) |
Abbreviations: N: No; NR: Not Report; Y: Yes; PRIMA: Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses; AMSTAR: Assessment of Multiple Systematic Reviews; QUOROM: Quality of Reporting of Meta-analyses; QATSDD: Quality Assessment Tool for Studies with Diverse Designs;
The summary statistics are absolute count (%) for categorical variables