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ANALGESIA

Increase in Quality, but Not Quantity, of Clinical Trials in Acute Pain: 1992 Versus 2007

From the Department of Anaesthesia, North West Regional Hospital, Burnie, Tasmania, Australia.

Address correspondence to Dr. Mark Reeves, MBBS, FANZCA, Department of Anaesthesia, North West Regional Hospital, Burnie, Tasmania, Australia. Address e-mail to mark.reeves{at}dhhs.tas.gov.au.

Abstract

The annual number of published clinical trials in acute postoperative pain in adults has changed little in 15 yr and, as a fraction of all clinical trials published in the six highest impact journals in anesthesiology, has actually decreased from 16% (95% confidence interval: 12-20) to 11% (95% confidence interval: 9-15). However, the methodological quality of reports has improved, with explicit statements on power analysis, allocation concealment, and specification of primary end points exceeding 90% of reports in 2007. There has been a shift in hypothesis interests away from neuraxial analgesia and toward multimodal analgesia.