Evaluation of the Endorsement of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) Statement on the Quality of Published Systematic Review and Meta-Analyses

PRISMA statement was published in 2009 in order to set standards in the reporting of systematic reviews and meta-analyses. Our aim was to evaluate the impact of PRISMA endorsement on the quality of reporting and methodological quality of systematic reviews and meta-analyses, published in journals in the field of gastroenterology and hepatology (GH).

Quality of reporting and methodological quality were evaluated by assessing the adherence of papers to PRISMA checklist and AMSTAR quality scale. After identifying the GH journals which endorsed PRISMA in instructions for authors (IA), we appraised: 15 papers published in 2012 explicitly mentioning PRISMA in the full text (Group A); 15 papers from the same journals published in 2012 not explicitly mentioning PRISMA in the full text (Group B); 30 papers published the year preceding PRISMA endorsement from the same journals as above (Group C); 30 papers published in 2012 on the 10 highest impact factor journals in GH which not endorsed PRISMA (Group D).