Management of evidence and conflict of interest in guidelines on early childhood allergy prevention and child nutrition: study protocol of a systematic synthesis of guidelines and explorative network analysis

Katharina Sieferle; Corinna Schaefer; Eva Maria Bitzer

doi:10.12688/f1000research.123571.2

Home Browse Management of evidence and conflict of interest in guidelines on early...

ALL Metrics

Views

Downloads

Get PDF

Get XML

Export

▬

✚

Study Protocol

Revised

Management of evidence and conflict of interest in guidelines on early childhood allergy prevention and child nutrition: study protocol of a systematic synthesis of guidelines and explorative network analysis

[version 2; peer review: 2 approved]

Katharina Sieferle¹, Corinna Schaefer², Eva Maria Bitzer¹

PUBLISHED 27 Dec 2023

Author details Author details

¹ Department of Public Health and Health Education, Pädagogische Hochschule, Freiburg, 79117, Germany
² Agency for Quality in Medicine, Berlin, Germany

Katharina Sieferle
Roles: Conceptualization, Data Curation, Formal Analysis, Methodology, Writing – Original Draft Preparation, Writing – Review & Editing

Corinna Schaefer
Roles: Conceptualization, Writing – Review & Editing

Eva Maria Bitzer
Roles: Conceptualization, Funding Acquisition, Methodology, Project Administration, Supervision, Writing – Original Draft Preparation, Writing – Review & Editing

OPEN PEER REVIEW

REVIEWER STATUS

This article is included in the Agriculture, Food and Nutrition gateway.

Abstract

Background

With the rising prevalence of allergic diseases in children, prevention of childhood allergies becomes an important public health issue. Recently, a paradigm shift is taking place in the approach to preventing allergies, and clinical practice guidelines (CPG) and food-based dietary guidelines (FBDG) play an important role in providing practitioners with the latest evidence and reliable guidance. However, concern about the methodological quality of the development of FBDGs and CPGs, including limitations in the systematic reviews, lack of transparency and unmanaged conflicts of interest (COI), reduce the trust in these guidelines.

Methods

We aim to synthesize the available guidance on early childhood allergy prevention (ECAP) through a systematic search for national and international CPGs and FBDGs concerning ECAP and child nutrition (CN) and to assess the quality of the guidelines and management of COI. Additionally, we will analyse the content and the evidence base of the recommendation statements. We aim to quantify the COI in guideline panellists and explore possible associations between COI and recommendations. Through a social network analysis, we expect to elucidate ties between panellists, researchers, institutions, industry and other sponsors. Guidelines are an important tool to inform healthcare practitioners with the newest evidence, but quality and reliability have to be high. This study will help identify potential for further improvement in the development of guidelines and the management of COI. If the social network analysis proves feasible and reveals more information on COI in comparison to disclosed COI from the previous analyses, the methodology can be developed further to identify undisclosed COIs in panelists.

Ethics and dissemination

This research does not require ethical approval because no human subjects are involved. Results will be published in international peer-reviewed open access journals and via presentations at scientific conferences.

Keywords

Early childhood allergy prevention, clinical practice guideline, food-based dietary guideline, conflict of interest

Corresponding author: Eva Maria Bitzer

Competing interests: KS and EMB declare no COI in the context of this study. CS is deputy director of a guideline developing institution and member of the guideline commission of the German Association of the scientific medical societies.

Grant information: This work is supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation, grant number: FOR 2959 BI 755/2-1) and is a subproject of the HELICAP Research Group on ECAP-related health literacy (https://www.helicap.org). The funding body was not involved in the study design; the collection, analysis and interpretation of the data and/or in the writing of the protocol.
The article processing charge was funded by the Baden-Württemberg Ministry of Science, Research and the Arts and the Pädagogische Hochschule Freiburg in the funding programme Open Access Publishing.
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

Copyright: © 2023 Sieferle K et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

How to cite: Sieferle K, Schaefer C and Bitzer EM. Management of evidence and conflict of interest in guidelines on early childhood allergy prevention and child nutrition: study protocol of a systematic synthesis of guidelines and explorative network analysis [version 2; peer review: 2 approved]. F1000Research 2023, 11:1290 (https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.123571.2) First published: 10 Nov 2022, 11:1290 (https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.123571.1) Latest published: 27 Dec 2023, 11:1290 (https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.123571.2)

Revised Amendments from Version 1

Following the reviewers’ comments, this revised version of the study protocol provides a more comprehensive description and explanation of the eligibility criteria (including the study population and year of publication) and a slightly revised search strategy. We now include only clinical practice guidelines and food-based dietary guidelines, in English and German language, despite the country of origin (modifications made in the search strategy, as well as in figure 1).
We added one citation regarding the definition of allergic diseases, and one citation to explain the included years of publication.

See the authors' detailed response to the review by Paxton Loke
See the authors' detailed response to the review by Nina Veetnisha Gunnarsson

Introduction

The prevalence and impact of allergic diseases,¹ including food allergies, eczema, contact dermatitis as well as hay fever and asthma,¹^,² is continuously rising, especially in children.³ Asthma and other allergic diseases reduce the quality of life and their economic burden is high.²^,³ Therefore prevention of childhood allergies is an important public health concern.³ Prevention of food allergies previously concentrated on avoidance of the potential allergen during pregnancy, breast-feeding and infancy, but based on the “dual-allergen-exposure hypothesis”⁴ a gradual paradigm shift is taking place in the approach to preventing allergies - from avoidance to early and sustained exposure. According to this hypothesis, exposure to food allergens through the skin can lead to allergic sensitization whereas early consumption of the food protein can induce oral tolerance.⁴ The hypothesis has been investigated in numerous trials with different objectives. Although the preventive effect of early introduction of peanuts and chicken eggs on food allergies has been confirmed in different systematic reviews,⁵^,⁶ there still remains uncertainty with respect to the definition of populations at risk and the preparation of food (e.g. boiled, pasteurised or raw egg). With regard to the prevention of eczema and asthma the findings are inconclusive⁷^–⁹ and additional studies are needed. Thus, despite extensive and ongoing research on early childhood allergy prevention (ECAP), the pieces of the puzzle revealed so far do not provide a comprehensive picture and several pieces are still missing.

In fields with rapidly evolving evidence such as ECAP, clinical practice guidelines (CPG) and food-based dietary guidelines (FBDG) play an important role in providing practitioners in allergy prevention and child nutrition (CN) with reliable guidance. FBDGs and CPGs are statements including recommendations intended to optimize health behaviour and patient care, which are ideally informed by systematic reviews of existing evidence and an assessment of the benefits and harm of alternative care options.¹⁰^,¹¹

It should be noted that guideline recommendations might change with new emerging evidence. Guidelines on allergy prevention used to recommend the avoidance of allergens, but Greer et al. argued in 2008 that there was insufficient evidence supporting the avoidance or a delayed introduction of solid foods to prevent allergic diseases¹² and the evidence landscape shifted in 2015 with the LEAP study,¹³ which provided new evidence regarding the early introduction of peanuts. As a result, more recent guidelines now advocate for an early introduction of solid foods instead.

Making guideline recommendations also always involves judgement: regarding the strengths and limitations of the evidence, the balance of benefits and harm and ethical or legal considerations.¹⁴ Thus, guidelines, though based on a systematic review, are far from “objective”. With respect to the prevention of food allergies the review of Perkin et al.,¹⁵ illustrates that guidelines interpret the evidence differently and come to diverging recommendation statements: While some institutions frame their statements according to the PICO-scheme of the underlying trials, i.e. the LEAP trial regarding the introduction of peanuts,¹³ others assume the evidence can be extrapolated to a variety of food allergens beyond peanut and chicken eggs and advocate for their early introduction.

Even if our understanding of the impact of FBDGs and CPGs on preventive practice and public health outcomes is limited, they have the potential to enhance translation of research into practice, improve healthcare quality and safety¹⁰^,¹⁶ and shape the professional and public discussion on health and nutrition.¹⁷

There is considerable concern from physicians, consumer groups and other stakeholders about the methodological quality of the development of FBDGs and CPGs, including limitations in the systematic reviews that serve as the evidence base for CPGs, lack of transparency and unmanaged conflicts of interest.¹⁸^–²² Diverging recommendations across guidelines might decrease the confidence in guidelines in general, if the reasoning leading to a recommendation statement is not transparent and no information regarding the developmental process of the guideline is provided.¹⁰^,²³ Organizations such as the U.S. Institute of Medicine and the Guidelines International Network (G-I-N) have therefore developed recommendations to define trustworthy guidelines.¹⁶

When assessed for their overall quality using the Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Evaluation (AGREE II) tool, CPGs on for example the management of pediatric Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus and the management of fever in children achieved insufficient scores in the domain ‘Rigor of development’, showing that the methodology of guideline development can still be improved.²⁴^,²⁵ However, to date there has been no systematic investigation of whether CPGs and FBDGs on ECAP comply with methodological standards in guideline development.

Conflicts of interest (COI) have also been identified as causing differences in recommendations¹⁸^,²¹^,²⁶ and in turn COI were suggested to be one of the most relevant factors impairing the public’s trust in nutrition guidelines.²⁷ In the context of guideline development COI can be understood as “circumstances that create a risk that professional judgements or actions regarding a primary interest will be unduly influenced by a secondary interest”.²⁸^,²⁹ Secondary interests can be divided into material interests, which include actions leading to direct financial gain, and non-material interests, which can include the pursuit of professional status and recognition, competition with other professionals, support of friends or colleagues, and access to or remaining in a group or network. COI can also be divided into direct financial COI, which arise from financial relationships with persons or organizations, including fees for lectures, investments or shares in products or services or study sponsorship, and into indirect COI. In addition to non-material COI, indirect COI also include intellectual COI, which refer to the increased risk of maintaining a specific point of view due to one’s own academic activities.³⁰

It has to be assumed that industry sponsorship is prevalent in ECAP³¹^–³³ and with the paradigm shift in allergy prevention, commercial interest might even be increasing with regard to “baby food add-ins” which claim to contain adequate doses of allergens to facilitate introduction and induce oral tolerance.¹⁵ Therefore, vested interests could be fostered as well. Standards for disclosure and management of COIs in guideline development have been set by the Guidelines International Network in 2015.³⁰ These recommendations include issues such as trying not to include members in the guideline development panel if they have (direct financial or indirect) COI, using standardized forms for the disclosure of interests, making disclosures of interests publicly available and easily accessible and others.³⁰ However, it has been shown that many guideline authors have potentially relevant undisclosed COI and COI management is often inadequate.³⁰^,³⁴^,³⁵ It is not yet known, to what extent policies and standards for management and disclosure of COI have been adopted for the development of guidelines on ECAP and whether this point is also acknowledged in FBDGs.³⁵^–³⁷ It is also not clear, whether COI in guideline development are associated with the content of the recommendations and with the prevalence of intervention- and industry-friendly recommendations.

Objective

This study aims to synthesise national and international guidelines on ECAP and child nutrition and to systematically assess their methodological quality. We aim to investigate the management of conflicts of interest in these guidelines and the possible association of the COI with the guideline recommendations. We will also use the data to explore and visualize the networks of guideline panellists in the field of ECAP and child nutrition.

Methods

The methods for the search strategy, selection and data collection processes will be reported based on the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines on the conduct of systematic reviews.³⁸ This protocol is reported in line with the PRISMA-P guidelines.⁵⁰

The study consists of three consecutive tasks:

1. Assess the quality of the guideline development process and the management of evidence and COI of CPGs and FBDGs on ECAP and CN and provide a content analysis of the recommendation statements and an analysis of the evidence base of the recommendation statements.
2. Quantify the amount of COI in guideline panel members and explore the association between the role of the panelist and COI and between COI and the recommendation statements.
3. Explore the merits of social network analysis as a tool to elucidate ties between guideline panel members, ECAP and CN researchers, and research sponsors.

Task 1

Search strategy

Only a small percentage of guidelines is published in databases like MEDLINE, Embase etc. Therefore we will conduct the systematic search for national and international CPGs and FBDGs concerning ECAP and CN according to established recommendations for guideline retrieval³⁹ including the following databases and websites: Guideline International Networks database on clinical guidelines (GIN), Turning Research into Practice (TRIP), ECRI Guidelines Trust and the Alliance for the implementation of Clinical Practice Guidelines (AiCPG) – the successor of the National Guideline Clearinghouse, the Association of the Scientific Medical Societies in Germany (AWMF), WHO, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), as well as national and international clinical specialty societies. MEDLINE will be searched using the CADTH filter for guidelines.⁴⁰ Furthermore, we aim to identify (supra) national institutions that report on dietary and/or clinical guidelines. For institutions reporting on FBDGs we will use the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) directory of FBDGs, that provides links to more than 100 guidelines from all over the world, summary information in English as well as additional resources.⁴¹ Figure 1 describes the search strategy.

Figure 1. Search strategy.

Legend: FAO=Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, WHO=World Health Organization, WP2=Work package 2, FBDG=Food-based Dietary Guideline, CPG=Clinical Practice Guideline.

These websites and databases do not have the same extensive search possibilities as bibliographic databases (like MEDLINE), but the following search filters will be applied if available: only fully published guidelines (no guidelines in development, withdrawn, etc.), publication year from 2010, publication in English or German. The search will be restricted to publications dating from 2010 up to now in order to capture the earliest guidelines that could have addressed the ongoing evidence shift as well as all recent guidelines.

Eligibility criteria

Screening of the retrieved publications will be done by two members of the study group. Disagreements will be resolved by discussion. Publications will be eligible for inclusion if they meet the following criteria:

• Population: Pregnant women or breastfeeding women or infants (up to one year) (with or without increased risk for the development of allergies or asthma) need to be addressed.
• Intervention: Primary prevention of IgE-mediated allergies, including atopic eczema, food allergies or asthma¹^,²
• Comparator: not applicable
• Outcome: New cases of immediate or IgE-mediated allergies, atopic eczema or asthma
• Time frame: dating from 2010, only guidelines that were valid at the time of search and the most recent updates
• Publication types: We will include full clinical practice guidelines, food-based dietary guidelines and possible addenda
• Language: English or German

Data extraction and quality assessment

Data of included guidelines will be extracted by the first author and cross-checked by another author. Data will be entered into a relational database using MS Access which facilitates data export for quantitative analysis. The following data will be extracted from each guideline: Guideline editor, leading scientific societies, sponsorship, contact and person responsible, composition of guideline panel (name, academic title, institution, area of expertise or profession, their tasks in relation to the preparation of the guideline), independence of the coordinators and lead authors, declaration and assessment of COI, report of any potential sources of COI (explanation of potential conflicts of interest, assessment of conflicts of interest, and managing conflicts of interest), direct COI (e.g. financial, personal, institutional benefits), indirect COI (e.g. clinical, academic, personal interest, membership or function in expert association, clinical activities, publications, author or co-authorship, research projects, conducting clinical trials, leading participation in educational institutes, personal relationships with a representative of a company in the healthcare industry), imposed abstentions because of COI and external review of the guideline draft and for each relevant recommendation statement the topic of recommendation, recommendation statement in plain text, level of evidence and grade of recommendation will be assessed.

Furthermore, we will extract data regarding the evidence base of the relevant recommendation statements including information on authors, publication type (in case of primary studies: study type, risk of bias), country and sponsorship for each cited study.

Besides the management and disclosure of COI, a balanced and varied composition of the guideline panel and of stakeholders involved in the guideline development is important to prevent single persons or professions from having a disproportionate influence on the recommendations. We will therefore also assess the composition of the guideline panels and stakeholders involved in the development of the included guidelines.

To determine the methodological stringency of guideline development, AGREE II will be employed. The methodological quality of each included guideline will be independently assessed by two authors. AGREE II consists of 23 items covering the following 6 domains: scope and purpose, stakeholder involvement, stringency of development, clarity of presentation, applicability and editorial independence. Additionally, 2 overall assessment items are included: The quality of the overall guideline rated on a scale from 1-7 and the decision as to whether the guideline would be recommended for use in practice. The AGREE II overall assessment of the guideline indicates the general quality of the guideline. It “requires the user to make a judgement as to the quality of the guideline, taking into account the criteria considered in the assessment process” [40 S.10]. Each item of the AGREE II instrument is scored on a 7-point scale (1=strongly disagree to 7=strongly agree). Quality scores of each domain will be calculated, by adding up the scores of the individual items in the domain and by scaling the obtained score as a percentage of the maximum possible score for that domain:

\frac{obtained score - minimum possible score}{maximum possible score - minimum possible score}

The six domain-scores are independent and shall not be aggregated into a single quality score.⁴² Discrepancies in scorings will be resolved by discussion between the two authors (KS, EMB).

Synthesis of results and analysis

The basic information of all included guidelines will be summarized narratively. Subsequently, guidelines will be categorized according to indications (e.g. food allergies, asthma, atopic eczema) to allow for content-related analysis within each group. Particular emphasis will be put on the respective comparisons of clinical practice guidelines regarding the prevention of food allergies in contrast to FBDG. First, we will compare the evidence base of recommendations. To this end, included publication types and number of citations will be analysed. In addition, the publications will be compared to the studies that have been included in a living systematic review of a neighbouring project within the HELICAP research group.⁴³ To complete the synthesis of guidelines, we will compare the recommendations issued by the different guidelines regarding the topic and tenor of each statement as well as the assigned level of evidence, and the respective grade of recommendation.

Task 2

The second part of the analysis will be dedicated to the disclosure and management of COI. We will investigate what kind of and how often particular COI are disclosed, what measures are taken to manage COI and we want to explore whether associations exist between topics and COI. If possible, the analysis will be carried out on the level of recommendation statements, otherwise information will be summarized per guideline. Then this analysis will be repeated, this time using the guideline authors as a unit of analysis. In order to capture relevant research activities of guideline panelists a co-author analysis will also be carried out: Authors and co-authors of studies that have been included in the living systematic review of our neighbouring project within HELICAP will be matched to a list of guideline panelists.⁴³

Task 3

In the third part of the analysis we will visualize collaboration networks between guideline panelists, researchers and research sponsors using a social network analysis.⁴⁴ Authors, institutions, and sponsors will be understood as “actors” and connections between them such as affiliations or joint publications will inform the “ties” between them.⁴⁴ Different metrics of density and centrality indices will be employed to represent relationships and patterns of interaction.⁴⁵ The strength of ties between two actors will be determined according to different indicators, e.g. the number of joint publications of two researchers or the funding a scientist received from a particular company within a particular time period.⁴⁵ These indicators are designed to identify core-actors (opinion-leaders), subgroups with closer relationships (cluster or cliques) as well as actors who serve as “bridges” and connect otherwise separated actors and clusters within a network.⁴⁶^–⁴⁸ Moreover, in a small pilot study, e.g. for German guideline authors, we will investigate the impact of additional information, e.g. congress programs or entries in study registries, on the shape of the networks.

For content-related analysis MAXQDA 2020, a software used in qualitative studies, will be employed. All statistical analysis will be conducted using SPSS Statistics 27. The network analysis will be carried out with Ucinet 6.⁴⁹

Patient and public involvement

Patients and/or the public were not involved in the design, conduct or reporting of this research.

Discussion

Allergy prevention in early childhood is a topic that warrants collaborative public health action as it affects the daily routine of parents in the areas of nutrition and environmental exposure. It involves different areas of medical expertise, and it requires policies for example regarding the reduction of air pollution and the development of a healthy environment. To our knowledge, this will be the first study synthesizing the internationally available guidance on the primary prevention of IgE-mediated allergies, atopic eczema and asthma in early childhood. The findings will facilitate an integrated perspective on this topic and can help promote a collaborative discussion.

There is evidence that often COI are not disclosed adequately,³⁴ therefore we want to assess the number of COI disclosed in guidelines on ECAP. Assuming, that guideline authors disclose possible COI and that the respective guidelines report these disclosures adequately, we will also be able to provide a comprehensive overview of existing COI in the field of ECAP. In addition, we will determine whether there are associations between the COI and the content of the guideline recommendations. To do this, we will evaluate the COI of guideline panel members in guidelines with conflicting recommendations.

On the one hand potential for further improvement in the management of COI in guidelines will be identified and on the other hand transparency and the reliability of the guidelines can be increased. Furthermore, we expect a new understanding of research networks in ECAP and possible sources of COI as relationships between the actors of a network become evident. For example, if a researcher receives regular funding from one sponsor, we have to assume a high risk of a financial COI or if two researchers seem to collaborate closely based on joint publications, we have to assume a high risk of indirect COI. If the social network analysis proves feasible and reveals more information on COI in comparison to disclosed COI from the previous analyses, the methodology will be developed further.

Ethics and dissemination

According to the ethic committee of the Chamber of Physicians Baden-Württemberg this research does not require an ethical approval because no human subjects are involved. Findings from this study will be published upon finalization in internationally peer-reviewed journals with focus on public health, allergy prevention and evidence-based medicine. The project consortium also establishes a plan to coordinate the participation of subprojects in national and international conferences of medical associations, e.g. European Academy of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, and German Society for Social Medicine and Prevention. When we publish our results, we do not mention any real names, so no conclusions can be drawn about individual persons.

Study status

At submission of this protocol the systematic search and screening of search results has been completed. The quality assessment of the guidelines through AGREE II has been finalized and the data extraction on management and disclosure of conflicts of interests is underway.

Data availability

Underlying data

No underlying data are associated with this article.

Reporting guidelines

Figshare: PRISMA-P checklist for “Management of evidence and conflict of interest in guidelines on early childhood allergy prevention and child nutrition: study protocol of a systematic synthesis of guidelines and explorative network analysis”. https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.21501462.v1.⁵⁰

Data are available under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (CC-BY 4.0).

References

1. Johansson S, Bieber T, Dahl R, et al.: Revised nomenclature for allergy for global use: Report of the Nomenclature Review Committee of the World Allergy Organization, October 2003.J. Allergy Clin. Immunol. 2004; 113(5): 832–836. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0091674904009303
2. Pawankar R, Canonica GW, Holgate ST, et al., editors. The WAO White Book on Allergy (Update 2013) 2013.
3. Pawankar R: Allergic diseases and asthma: a global public health concern and a call to action. World Allergy Organ J. 2014; 7(1): 12. [published Online First: 19 June 2014]. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
4. Lack G: Epidemiologic risks for food allergy. J. Allergy Clin. Immunol. 2008; 121(6): 1331–1336. Publisher Full Text
5. Ierodiakonou D, Garcia-Larsen V, Logan A, et al.: Timing of Allergenic Food Introduction to the Infant Diet and Risk of Allergic or Autoimmune Disease: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis. JAMA. 2016; 316(11): 1181–1192. Publisher Full Text
6. de Silva D , Halken S, Singh C, et al.: Preventing food allergy in infancy and childhood: Systematic review of randomised controlled trials. Pediatr. Allergy Immunol. 2020.
7. Chalmers JR, Haines RH, Bradshaw LE, et al.: Daily emollient during infancy for prevention of eczema: the BEEP randomised controlled trial. Lancet. 2020; 395: 962–972. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
8. Skjerven HO, Rehbinder EM, Vettukattil R, et al.: Skin emollient and early complementary feeding to prevent infant atopic dermatitis (PreventADALL): a factorial, multicentre, cluster-randomised trial. Lancet. 2020; 395: 951–961. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
9. Roßberg S, Keller T, Icke K, et al.: Orally applied bacterial lysate in infants at risk for atopy does not prevent atopic dermatitis, allergic rhinitis, asthma or allergic sensitization at school age: Follow-up of a randomized trial. Allergy. 2020; 75(8): 2020–2025. Publisher Full Text
10. Graham R: Clinical practice guidelines we can trust. Washington, DC: National Academies Press; 2011.
11. Franz MJ, Boucher JL, Green-Pastors J, et al.: Evidence-based nutrition practice guidelines for diabetes and scope and standards of practice. J. Am. Diet. Assoc. 2008; 108(4 Suppl 1): S52–S58. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
12. Greer FR, Sicherer SH, Burks AW: Effects of early nutritional interventions on the development of atopic disease in infants and children: the role of maternal dietary restriction, breastfeeding, timing of introduction of complementary foods, and hydrolyzed formulas. Pediatrics. 2008; 121(1): 183–191. Publisher Full Text
13. Du Toit G, Roberts G, Sayre PH, et al.: Randomized trial of peanut consumption in infants at risk for peanut allergy. N. Engl. J. Med. 2015; 372(9): 803–813. [published Online First: 24 February 2015]. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
14. Arbeitsgemeinschaft der Wissenschaftlichen Medizinischen Fachgesellschaften (AWMF) - Ständige Kommission Leitlinien. AWMF-Regelwerk “Leitlinien”.1. Auflage 2012 2012. (accessed 27 Jul 2021). Reference Source Reference Source
15. Perkin MR, Togias A, Koplin J, et al.: Food Allergy Prevention: More Than Peanut. J. Allergy Clin. Immunol.: Pract. 2020; 8(1): 1–13. Publisher Full Text Reference Source
16. Qaseem A, Forland F, Macbeth F, et al.: Guidelines International Network: Toward international standards for clinical practice guidelines. Ann. Intern. Med. 2012; 156(7): 525–531. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
17. Weishaar H, Dorfman L, Freudenberg N, et al.: Why media representations of corporations matter for public health policy: A scoping review. BMC Public Health. 2016; 16: 899. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
18. Bindslev JBB, Schroll JB, Gøtzsche PC, et al.: Underreporting of conflicts of interest in clinical practice guidelines: Cross sectional study. BMC Med. Ethics. 2013; 14: 19. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
19. Hansen C, Lundh A, Rasmussen K, et al.: Financial conflicts of interest and outcomes and quality of systematic reviews. Cochrane Database Syst. Rev. 2017; 365(9465): 1159.
20. Lundh A, Lexchin J, Mintzes B, et al.: Industry sponsorship and research outcome. Cochrane Database Syst. Rev. 2017; 2017: MR000033. Publisher Full Text
21. Shekelle PG: Clinical practice guidelines: What’s next? JAMA. 2018; 320(8): 757–758. Publisher Full Text Reference Source
22. Montagnese C, Santarpia L, Buonifacio M, et al.: European food-based dietary guidelines: A comparison and update. Nutrition. 2015; 31(7-8): 908–915. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
23. Schünemann H, Brożek J, Guyatt G, et al.: GRADE Handbook: for grading the quality of evidence and the strength of recommendations using the GRADE approach.2013. Accessed April 06, 2020. Reference Source
24. Bhatt M, Nahari A, Wang P-W, et al.: The quality of clinical practice guidelines for management of pediatric type 2 diabetes mellitus: a systematic review using the AGREE II instrument. Syst. Rev. 2018; 7(1): 193. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
25. Chiappini E, Bortone B, Galli L, et al.: Guidelines for the symptomatic management of fever in children: systematic review of the literature and quality appraisal with AGREE II. BMJ Open. 2017; 7(7): e015404. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
26. Neuman J, Korenstein D, Ross JS, et al.: Prevalence of financial conflicts of interest among panel members producing clinical practice guidelines in Canada and United States: Cross sectional study. BMJ. 2011; 343: d5621. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
27. Garza C, Stover PJ, Ohlhorst SD, et al.: Best practices in nutrition science to earn and keep the public's trust. Am. J. Clin. Nutr. 2019; 109(1): 225–243. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
28. Lo B, Field MJ: Conflict of interest in medical research, education, and practice. Washington D.C.: National Academies Press; 2009.
29. Thompson DF: Understanding financial conflicts of interest. N. Engl. J. Med. 1993; 329(8): 573–576. Publisher Full Text
30. Schünemann HJ, Al-Ansary LA, Forland F, et al.: Guidelines International Network: Principles for disclosure of interests and management of conflicts in guidelines. Ann. Intern. Med. 2015; 163(7): 548–553. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
31. van Tulleken C : Overdiagnosis and industry influence: how cow’s milk protein allergy is extending the reach of infant formula manufacturers. BMJ. 2018; 363: k5056. Publisher Full Text Reference Source
32. Chartres N, Fabbri A, Bero LA: Association of industry sponsorship with outcomes of nutrition studies: A systematic review and meta-analysis. JAMA Intern. Med. 2016; 176(12): 1769–1777. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
33. Mozaffarian D, Forouhi NG: Dietary guidelines and health-is nutrition science up to the task? BMJ. 2018; 360: k822. Publisher Full Text
34. Moynihan R, Lai A, Jarvis H, et al.: Undisclosed financial ties between guideline writers and pharmaceutical companies: a cross-sectional study across 10 disease categories. BMJ Open. 2019; 9(2): e025864. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
35. Norris SL, Holmer HK, Ogden LA, et al.: Conflict of interest disclosures for clinical practice guidelines in the national guideline clearinghouse. PLoS One. 2012; 7(11): e47343. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
36. Arbeitsgemeinschaft der Wissenschaftlichen Medizinischen Fachgesellschaften [AWMF]. [AWMF form for declaring interests in guideline projects].2018. Accessed October 02, 2018. Reference Source
37. Qaseem A, Wilt TJ: Disclosure of Interests and Management of Conflicts of Interest in Clinical Guidelines and Guidance Statements: Methods From the Clinical Guidelines Committee of the American College of Physicians. Ann. Intern. Med. 2019; 171(53): 309–388. Reference Source
38. Moher D, Liberati A, Tetzlaff J, et al.: Preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses: the PRISMA statement. J. Clin. Epidemiol. 2009; 62(10): 1006–1012. [published Online First: 28 July 2009]. Publisher Full Text
39. Blümle A, Sow D, Nothacker M, et al.: Manual systematische Recherche für Evidenzsynthesen und Leitlinien. Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg; 2019.
40. Canadian Agency for Drugs and Technologies in Health (CADTH): Strings attached: CADTH database search filters 2016. Accessed September 01, 2020. Reference Source Reference Source
41. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations: Food-based dieatary guidelines. Accessed September 01, 2020. Reference Source Reference Source
42. Brouwers MC, Kho ME, Browman GP, et al.: AGREE II: Advancing guideline development, reporting and evaluation in health care. CMAJ. 2010; 182(18): E839–E842. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
43. Matterne U, Tischer C, Wang J, et al.: The evidence for interventions in early childhood allergy prevention – towards a living systematic review: protocol. F1000Res. 2021; 10: 235. Publisher Full Text
44. Newman ME: Scientific collaboration networks. I. Network construction and fundamental results. Phys. Rev. E Stat. Nonlinear Soft Matter Phys. 2001; 64(1 Pt 2): 16131. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text
45. Newman ME: Scientific collaboration networks. II. Shortest paths, weighted networks, and centrality. Phys. Rev. E Stat. Nonlinear Soft Matter Phys. 2001; 64. Publisher Full Text
46. Zhao Y, Zhao R: Evolutionary analysis of collaboration networks in scientometrics. Scientometrics. 2016; 107(2): 759–772. Publisher Full Text
47. Popp J, Balogh P, Oláh J, et al.: Social network analysis of scientific articles published by food policy. Sustainability. 2018; 10(3): 577. Publisher Full Text
48. de Brún A , McAuliffe E: Social network analysis as a methodological approach to explore health systems: A case study exploring support among senior managers/executives in a hospital network. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health. 2018; 15(3). Publisher Full Text
49. Borgatti S, Everett M, Freeman LC: Ucinet 6 for Windows: Software for social network analysis. User's guide. Harvard, MA: Analytic Technologies; 2012.
50. Sieferle K: PRISMA-P checklist HELICAP WP1 (COI). figshare. [Dataset]. Journal Contribution. 2022. Publisher Full Text

Comments on this article Comments (0)

Version 2

VERSION 2 PUBLISHED 10 Nov 2022

Author details Author details

¹ Department of Public Health and Health Education, Pädagogische Hochschule, Freiburg, 79117, Germany
² Agency for Quality in Medicine, Berlin, Germany

Katharina Sieferle
Roles: Conceptualization, Data Curation, Formal Analysis, Methodology, Writing – Original Draft Preparation, Writing – Review & Editing

Corinna Schaefer
Roles: Conceptualization, Writing – Review & Editing

Eva Maria Bitzer
Roles: Conceptualization, Funding Acquisition, Methodology, Project Administration, Supervision, Writing – Original Draft Preparation, Writing – Review & Editing

Competing interests

KS and EMB declare no COI in the context of this study. CS is deputy director of a guideline developing institution and member of the guideline commission of the German Association of the scientific medical societies.

Grant information

This work is supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation, grant number: FOR 2959 BI 755/2-1) and is a subproject of the HELICAP Research Group on ECAP-related health literacy (https://www.helicap.org). The funding body was not involved in the study design; the collection, analysis and interpretation of the data and/or in the writing of the protocol.
The article processing charge was funded by the Baden-Württemberg Ministry of Science, Research and the Arts and the Pädagogische Hochschule Freiburg in the funding programme Open Access Publishing.
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

Article Versions (2)

version 2

Revised

Published: 27 Dec 2023, 11:1290

https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.123571.2

version 1

Published: 10 Nov 2022, 11:1290

https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.123571.1

© 2023 Sieferle K et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Download

Export To

metrics

	Views	Downloads
F1000Research	-	-
PubMed Central Data from PMC are received and updated monthly.	-	-

Citations

SEE MORE DETAILS

CITE

how to cite this article

Sieferle K, Schaefer C and Bitzer EM. Management of evidence and conflict of interest in guidelines on early childhood allergy prevention and child nutrition: study protocol of a systematic synthesis of guidelines and explorative network analysis [version 2; peer review: 2 approved]. F1000Research 2023, 11:1290 (https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.123571.2)

NOTE: If applicable, it is important to ensure the information in square brackets after the title is included in all citations of this article.

track

receive updates on this article

Track an article to receive email alerts on any updates to this article.

Open Peer Review

Version 2

VERSION 2

PUBLISHED 27 Dec 2023

Revised

Views

Reviewer Report 17 Jan 2024

Paxton Loke, Allergy Immunology, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, Parkville, Victoria, Australia

Approved

https://doi.org/10.5256/f1000research.160241.r233757

No ... Continue reading

CITE

Report a concern

Respond or Comment

Views

Reviewer Report 11 Jan 2024

Nina Veetnisha Gunnarsson, School of Health and Welfare, Jönköping University, Jönköping, Sweden

Approved

https://doi.org/10.5256/f1000research.160241.r233756

I am happy with the changes made by the authors and I do belive that reducing the ... Continue reading

CITE

Report a concern

Respond or Comment

Version 1

VERSION 1

PUBLISHED 10 Nov 2022

Views

Reviewer Report 15 Sep 2023

Nina Veetnisha Gunnarsson, School of Health and Welfare, Jönköping University, Jönköping, Sweden

Approved with Reservations

https://doi.org/10.5256/f1000research.135689.r206646

This is a very innovative and interesting systematic review and synthesis of child allergy guidelines.

What is meant with immediate allergies? Clarify.
In figure 1, why were these countries included specifically

This is a very innovative and interesting systematic review and synthesis of child allergy guidelines.

What is meant with immediate allergies? Clarify.
In figure 1, why were these countries included specifically and not others?
Population: infants up to one year? Rational behind this?
A replication of the study may be difficult, as there are many different analysis and tasks.
Time frame: from 2010, rational behind this choice?
Publication types: additional type of texts such as position papers, consensus statements etc, is this needed, and if, why?

Is the rationale for, and objectives of, the study clearly described?

Yes
Is the study design appropriate for the research question?

Yes
Are sufficient details of the methods provided to allow replication by others?

Partly
Are the datasets clearly presented in a useable and accessible format?

Yes

Competing Interests: No competing interests were disclosed.

Reviewer Expertise: Allergy, food allergy

I confirm that I have read this submission and believe that I have an appropriate level of expertise to confirm that it is of an acceptable scientific standard, however I have significant reservations, as outlined above.

CITE

Report a concern

Author Response 17 Jan 2024

Katharina Sieferle, Department of Public Health and Health Education, Pädagogische Hochschule, Freiburg, 79117, Germany

17 Jan 2024

Author Response

1. What is meant with immediate allergies? Clarify.

We have originally used the phrase immediate allergies and IgE-mediated allergies in the study protocol, both meaning type I hypersensitivity reactions. ... Continue reading 1. What is meant with immediate allergies? Clarify.

We have originally used the phrase immediate allergies and IgE-mediated allergies in the study protocol, both meaning type I hypersensitivity reactions. We have decided to now only use IgE-mediated allergies to prevent any possible confusion or misunderstanding.

2. In figure 1, why were these countries included specifically and not others?

This was originally decided due to feasibility reasons, expecting most English-speaking guidelines to originate from the included countries. After additional consideration, we have decided not to exclude other countries, and to instead include all available guidelines in English.
The search strategy has been updated and a new figure 1 has been included.

3. Population: infants up to one year? Rational behind this?

The topic of interest of the research group is allergy prevention in early childhood and infancy. The first year of life is an important time for allergy prevention, since many allergy prevention measures concern the duration of breastfeeding and (timing of) introduction of complementary feeding, which typically is recommended to take place in the first year of life.
To be included in our analysis, guidelines do not need to exclusively address children under 1 year of life but should make recommendations on the first year of life, or on interventions in the mother during pregnancy.
The text was changed in the manuscript to make this clearer.

4. A replication of the study may be difficult, as there are many different analysis and tasks.

This study is part of a German research group and is divided into three tasks. This study protocol covers the whole study with all included tasks. However, all tasks will be conducted and analyzed individually, making replication of the tasks easier.

5. Time frame: from 2010, rational behind this choice?

Even though as early as 2008 avoidance of common allergens to prevent allergies was no longer recommended, there was a lack of evidence on allergy prevention measures (Greer et al. 2008). The LEAP study was published in 2015, leading to a further evidence shift towards an early introduction of common allergens (Du Toit et al. 2015). With guidelines from 2010 to 2019, we aim to be able to see this resulting shift in recommendations and underlying evidence. Additionally, only valid guidelines should be included in the analysis. Many guideline-developing organizations have set timeframes for guidelines to be valid for after publication. Guidelines older than 2010 should therefore definitely not be valid anymore at the time of search.
We have included a more comprehensive rationale in the text.

6. Publication types: additional type of texts such as position papers, consensus statements etc, is this needed, and if, why?

Thank you for this question/suggestion.
After additional consideration, we have decided to only include Clinical Practice Guidelines and Food-based Dietary Guidelines that make recommendations on Early Childhood Allergy Prevention, to compare these two publication types.
Eligibility criteria were changed accordingly in the manuscript.
1. What is meant with immediate allergies? Clarify.

We have originally used the phrase immediate allergies and IgE-mediated allergies in the study protocol, both meaning type I hypersensitivity reactions. We have decided to now only use IgE-mediated allergies to prevent any possible confusion or misunderstanding.

2. In figure 1, why were these countries included specifically and not others?

This was originally decided due to feasibility reasons, expecting most English-speaking guidelines to originate from the included countries. After additional consideration, we have decided not to exclude other countries, and to instead include all available guidelines in English.
The search strategy has been updated and a new figure 1 has been included.

3. Population: infants up to one year? Rational behind this?

The topic of interest of the research group is allergy prevention in early childhood and infancy. The first year of life is an important time for allergy prevention, since many allergy prevention measures concern the duration of breastfeeding and (timing of) introduction of complementary feeding, which typically is recommended to take place in the first year of life.
To be included in our analysis, guidelines do not need to exclusively address children under 1 year of life but should make recommendations on the first year of life, or on interventions in the mother during pregnancy.
The text was changed in the manuscript to make this clearer.

4. A replication of the study may be difficult, as there are many different analysis and tasks.

This study is part of a German research group and is divided into three tasks. This study protocol covers the whole study with all included tasks. However, all tasks will be conducted and analyzed individually, making replication of the tasks easier.

5. Time frame: from 2010, rational behind this choice?

Even though as early as 2008 avoidance of common allergens to prevent allergies was no longer recommended, there was a lack of evidence on allergy prevention measures (Greer et al. 2008). The LEAP study was published in 2015, leading to a further evidence shift towards an early introduction of common allergens (Du Toit et al. 2015). With guidelines from 2010 to 2019, we aim to be able to see this resulting shift in recommendations and underlying evidence. Additionally, only valid guidelines should be included in the analysis. Many guideline-developing organizations have set timeframes for guidelines to be valid for after publication. Guidelines older than 2010 should therefore definitely not be valid anymore at the time of search.
We have included a more comprehensive rationale in the text.

6. Publication types: additional type of texts such as position papers, consensus statements etc, is this needed, and if, why?

Thank you for this question/suggestion.
After additional consideration, we have decided to only include Clinical Practice Guidelines and Food-based Dietary Guidelines that make recommendations on Early Childhood Allergy Prevention, to compare these two publication types.
Eligibility criteria were changed accordingly in the manuscript.
Competing Interests: No competing interests were disclosed. Close
Report a concern
Respond or Comment

COMMENTS ON THIS REPORT

Author Response 17 Jan 2024

Katharina Sieferle, Department of Public Health and Health Education, Pädagogische Hochschule, Freiburg, 79117, Germany

17 Jan 2024

Author Response

1. What is meant with immediate allergies? Clarify.

We have originally used the phrase immediate allergies and IgE-mediated allergies in the study protocol, both meaning type I hypersensitivity reactions. ... Continue reading 1. What is meant with immediate allergies? Clarify.

We have originally used the phrase immediate allergies and IgE-mediated allergies in the study protocol, both meaning type I hypersensitivity reactions. We have decided to now only use IgE-mediated allergies to prevent any possible confusion or misunderstanding.

2. In figure 1, why were these countries included specifically and not others?

This was originally decided due to feasibility reasons, expecting most English-speaking guidelines to originate from the included countries. After additional consideration, we have decided not to exclude other countries, and to instead include all available guidelines in English.
The search strategy has been updated and a new figure 1 has been included.

3. Population: infants up to one year? Rational behind this?

The topic of interest of the research group is allergy prevention in early childhood and infancy. The first year of life is an important time for allergy prevention, since many allergy prevention measures concern the duration of breastfeeding and (timing of) introduction of complementary feeding, which typically is recommended to take place in the first year of life.
To be included in our analysis, guidelines do not need to exclusively address children under 1 year of life but should make recommendations on the first year of life, or on interventions in the mother during pregnancy.
The text was changed in the manuscript to make this clearer.

4. A replication of the study may be difficult, as there are many different analysis and tasks.

This study is part of a German research group and is divided into three tasks. This study protocol covers the whole study with all included tasks. However, all tasks will be conducted and analyzed individually, making replication of the tasks easier.

5. Time frame: from 2010, rational behind this choice?

Even though as early as 2008 avoidance of common allergens to prevent allergies was no longer recommended, there was a lack of evidence on allergy prevention measures (Greer et al. 2008). The LEAP study was published in 2015, leading to a further evidence shift towards an early introduction of common allergens (Du Toit et al. 2015). With guidelines from 2010 to 2019, we aim to be able to see this resulting shift in recommendations and underlying evidence. Additionally, only valid guidelines should be included in the analysis. Many guideline-developing organizations have set timeframes for guidelines to be valid for after publication. Guidelines older than 2010 should therefore definitely not be valid anymore at the time of search.
We have included a more comprehensive rationale in the text.

6. Publication types: additional type of texts such as position papers, consensus statements etc, is this needed, and if, why?

Thank you for this question/suggestion.
After additional consideration, we have decided to only include Clinical Practice Guidelines and Food-based Dietary Guidelines that make recommendations on Early Childhood Allergy Prevention, to compare these two publication types.
Eligibility criteria were changed accordingly in the manuscript.
1. What is meant with immediate allergies? Clarify.

We have originally used the phrase immediate allergies and IgE-mediated allergies in the study protocol, both meaning type I hypersensitivity reactions. We have decided to now only use IgE-mediated allergies to prevent any possible confusion or misunderstanding.

2. In figure 1, why were these countries included specifically and not others?

This was originally decided due to feasibility reasons, expecting most English-speaking guidelines to originate from the included countries. After additional consideration, we have decided not to exclude other countries, and to instead include all available guidelines in English.
The search strategy has been updated and a new figure 1 has been included.

3. Population: infants up to one year? Rational behind this?

The topic of interest of the research group is allergy prevention in early childhood and infancy. The first year of life is an important time for allergy prevention, since many allergy prevention measures concern the duration of breastfeeding and (timing of) introduction of complementary feeding, which typically is recommended to take place in the first year of life.
To be included in our analysis, guidelines do not need to exclusively address children under 1 year of life but should make recommendations on the first year of life, or on interventions in the mother during pregnancy.
The text was changed in the manuscript to make this clearer.

4. A replication of the study may be difficult, as there are many different analysis and tasks.

This study is part of a German research group and is divided into three tasks. This study protocol covers the whole study with all included tasks. However, all tasks will be conducted and analyzed individually, making replication of the tasks easier.

5. Time frame: from 2010, rational behind this choice?

Even though as early as 2008 avoidance of common allergens to prevent allergies was no longer recommended, there was a lack of evidence on allergy prevention measures (Greer et al. 2008). The LEAP study was published in 2015, leading to a further evidence shift towards an early introduction of common allergens (Du Toit et al. 2015). With guidelines from 2010 to 2019, we aim to be able to see this resulting shift in recommendations and underlying evidence. Additionally, only valid guidelines should be included in the analysis. Many guideline-developing organizations have set timeframes for guidelines to be valid for after publication. Guidelines older than 2010 should therefore definitely not be valid anymore at the time of search.
We have included a more comprehensive rationale in the text.

6. Publication types: additional type of texts such as position papers, consensus statements etc, is this needed, and if, why?

Thank you for this question/suggestion.
After additional consideration, we have decided to only include Clinical Practice Guidelines and Food-based Dietary Guidelines that make recommendations on Early Childhood Allergy Prevention, to compare these two publication types.
Eligibility criteria were changed accordingly in the manuscript.
Competing Interests: No competing interests were disclosed. Close
Report a concern

Views

Reviewer Report 12 Sep 2023

Paxton Loke, Allergy Immunology, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, Parkville, Victoria, Australia

Approved with Reservations

https://doi.org/10.5256/f1000research.135689.r202322

This is an interesting study proposal in particular the conflict of interest aspect. Below are a few comments for clarification.

The search strategy in Figure 1 did not include Asia or Asian countries. Please comment on

This is an interesting study proposal in particular the conflict of interest aspect. Below are a few comments for clarification.

The search strategy in Figure 1 did not include Asia or Asian countries. Please comment on why these countries are excluded.
Please comment on including German publications and not any other languages besides English.
Population: Please comment on the rationale of including only infants up to one year and whether or not this may be overly restrictive.
Will the definition of IgE-mediated allergies, atopic eczema or asthma be included in the final publication?
Regarding Task 3: Please comment on whether or not there will be any bias and how this will be addressed. For example, it is possible that authors may collaborate to harness different expertise for a common goal, and this may not necessary be a conflict of interest.
Minor comment in Introduction: suggest deleting “only” from this sentence “…children only achieved insufficient scores…”

Is the rationale for, and objectives of, the study clearly described?

Yes
Is the study design appropriate for the research question?

Yes
Are sufficient details of the methods provided to allow replication by others?

Yes
Are the datasets clearly presented in a useable and accessible format?

Not applicable

Competing Interests: No competing interests were disclosed.

Reviewer Expertise: Food allergy

CITE

Report a concern

Author Response 17 Jan 2024

Katharina Sieferle, Department of Public Health and Health Education, Pädagogische Hochschule, Freiburg, 79117, Germany

17 Jan 2024

Author Response

The search strategy in Figure 1 did not include Asia or Asian countries. Please comment on why these countries are excluded.

-> This was originally decided due to feasibility ... Continue reading The search strategy in Figure 1 did not include Asia or Asian countries. Please comment on why these countries are excluded.

-> This was originally decided due to feasibility reasons, expecting most English-speaking guidelines to originate from the included countries. After additional consideration, we have decided not to exclude Asian countries or other countries, and to instead include all available guidelines in English.
The search strategy has been updated and a new figure 1 has been included.

Please comment on including German publications and not any other languages besides English.

-> We included German guidelines because this study is part of a German research group on Public Health, making the German perspective especially relevant.
Besides German, only guidelines in English were included, due to feasibility and limited resources.

Population: Please comment on the rationale of including only infants up to one year and whether or not this may be overly restrictive.

-> The topic of interest of the research group is allergy prevention in early childhood and infancy. The first year of life is an important time for allergy prevention, since many allergy prevention measures concern the duration of breastfeeding and (timing of) introduction of complementary feeding, which typically is recommended to take place in the first year of life.
To be included in our analysis, guidelines do not need to exclusively address children under 1 year of life but should make recommendations on the first year of life, or on interventions in the mother during pregnancy and breastfeeding. We therefore think this will not be too restrictive.
The text was revised in the manuscript to make this clearer.

Will the definition of IgE-mediated allergies, atopic eczema or asthma be included in the final publication?

-> So far, we had not included a definition, but upon your question have now included further references, on which we have based our understanding of allergic diseases, in the study protocol.

Regarding Task 3: Please comment on whether or not there will be any bias and how this will be addressed. For example, it is possible that authors may collaborate to harness different expertise for a common goal, and this may not necessary be a conflict of interest.

-> We are not sure if we understood this comment correctly.
Ideally, a guideline panel should encourage authors from different areas of expertise that are relevant to the subject area of the guideline, as well as patients or citizens to collaborate. A diverse guideline panel facilitates the consideration of different perspectives and helps avoid possible distortions caused by secondary interests.
Conflicts that might arise from different expertise belong to the category of intellectual conflicts of interest, which we don’t see as severe. We are primarily interested in direct financial and personal interests, to what extent they occur and if they occur, how they are managed.
We hope this answered your question?

Minor comment in Introduction: suggest deleting “only” from this sentence “…children only achieved insufficient scores…”

-> Thank you for the suggestion, the text was changed accordingly.
The search strategy in Figure 1 did not include Asia or Asian countries. Please comment on why these countries are excluded.

-> This was originally decided due to feasibility reasons, expecting most English-speaking guidelines to originate from the included countries. After additional consideration, we have decided not to exclude Asian countries or other countries, and to instead include all available guidelines in English.
The search strategy has been updated and a new figure 1 has been included.

Please comment on including German publications and not any other languages besides English.

-> We included German guidelines because this study is part of a German research group on Public Health, making the German perspective especially relevant.
Besides German, only guidelines in English were included, due to feasibility and limited resources.

Population: Please comment on the rationale of including only infants up to one year and whether or not this may be overly restrictive.

-> The topic of interest of the research group is allergy prevention in early childhood and infancy. The first year of life is an important time for allergy prevention, since many allergy prevention measures concern the duration of breastfeeding and (timing of) introduction of complementary feeding, which typically is recommended to take place in the first year of life.
To be included in our analysis, guidelines do not need to exclusively address children under 1 year of life but should make recommendations on the first year of life, or on interventions in the mother during pregnancy and breastfeeding. We therefore think this will not be too restrictive.
The text was revised in the manuscript to make this clearer.

Will the definition of IgE-mediated allergies, atopic eczema or asthma be included in the final publication?

-> So far, we had not included a definition, but upon your question have now included further references, on which we have based our understanding of allergic diseases, in the study protocol.

Regarding Task 3: Please comment on whether or not there will be any bias and how this will be addressed. For example, it is possible that authors may collaborate to harness different expertise for a common goal, and this may not necessary be a conflict of interest.

-> We are not sure if we understood this comment correctly.
Ideally, a guideline panel should encourage authors from different areas of expertise that are relevant to the subject area of the guideline, as well as patients or citizens to collaborate. A diverse guideline panel facilitates the consideration of different perspectives and helps avoid possible distortions caused by secondary interests.
Conflicts that might arise from different expertise belong to the category of intellectual conflicts of interest, which we don’t see as severe. We are primarily interested in direct financial and personal interests, to what extent they occur and if they occur, how they are managed.
We hope this answered your question?

Minor comment in Introduction: suggest deleting “only” from this sentence “…children only achieved insufficient scores…”

-> Thank you for the suggestion, the text was changed accordingly.
Competing Interests: No competing interests were disclosed. Close
Report a concern
Respond or Comment

COMMENTS ON THIS REPORT

Author Response 17 Jan 2024

Katharina Sieferle, Department of Public Health and Health Education, Pädagogische Hochschule, Freiburg, 79117, Germany

17 Jan 2024

Author Response

The search strategy in Figure 1 did not include Asia or Asian countries. Please comment on why these countries are excluded.

-> This was originally decided due to feasibility ... Continue reading The search strategy in Figure 1 did not include Asia or Asian countries. Please comment on why these countries are excluded.

-> This was originally decided due to feasibility reasons, expecting most English-speaking guidelines to originate from the included countries. After additional consideration, we have decided not to exclude Asian countries or other countries, and to instead include all available guidelines in English.
The search strategy has been updated and a new figure 1 has been included.

Please comment on including German publications and not any other languages besides English.

-> We included German guidelines because this study is part of a German research group on Public Health, making the German perspective especially relevant.
Besides German, only guidelines in English were included, due to feasibility and limited resources.

Population: Please comment on the rationale of including only infants up to one year and whether or not this may be overly restrictive.

-> The topic of interest of the research group is allergy prevention in early childhood and infancy. The first year of life is an important time for allergy prevention, since many allergy prevention measures concern the duration of breastfeeding and (timing of) introduction of complementary feeding, which typically is recommended to take place in the first year of life.
To be included in our analysis, guidelines do not need to exclusively address children under 1 year of life but should make recommendations on the first year of life, or on interventions in the mother during pregnancy and breastfeeding. We therefore think this will not be too restrictive.
The text was revised in the manuscript to make this clearer.

Will the definition of IgE-mediated allergies, atopic eczema or asthma be included in the final publication?

-> So far, we had not included a definition, but upon your question have now included further references, on which we have based our understanding of allergic diseases, in the study protocol.

Regarding Task 3: Please comment on whether or not there will be any bias and how this will be addressed. For example, it is possible that authors may collaborate to harness different expertise for a common goal, and this may not necessary be a conflict of interest.

-> We are not sure if we understood this comment correctly.
Ideally, a guideline panel should encourage authors from different areas of expertise that are relevant to the subject area of the guideline, as well as patients or citizens to collaborate. A diverse guideline panel facilitates the consideration of different perspectives and helps avoid possible distortions caused by secondary interests.
Conflicts that might arise from different expertise belong to the category of intellectual conflicts of interest, which we don’t see as severe. We are primarily interested in direct financial and personal interests, to what extent they occur and if they occur, how they are managed.
We hope this answered your question?

Minor comment in Introduction: suggest deleting “only” from this sentence “…children only achieved insufficient scores…”

-> Thank you for the suggestion, the text was changed accordingly.
The search strategy in Figure 1 did not include Asia or Asian countries. Please comment on why these countries are excluded.

-> This was originally decided due to feasibility reasons, expecting most English-speaking guidelines to originate from the included countries. After additional consideration, we have decided not to exclude Asian countries or other countries, and to instead include all available guidelines in English.
The search strategy has been updated and a new figure 1 has been included.

Please comment on including German publications and not any other languages besides English.

-> We included German guidelines because this study is part of a German research group on Public Health, making the German perspective especially relevant.
Besides German, only guidelines in English were included, due to feasibility and limited resources.

Population: Please comment on the rationale of including only infants up to one year and whether or not this may be overly restrictive.

-> The topic of interest of the research group is allergy prevention in early childhood and infancy. The first year of life is an important time for allergy prevention, since many allergy prevention measures concern the duration of breastfeeding and (timing of) introduction of complementary feeding, which typically is recommended to take place in the first year of life.
To be included in our analysis, guidelines do not need to exclusively address children under 1 year of life but should make recommendations on the first year of life, or on interventions in the mother during pregnancy and breastfeeding. We therefore think this will not be too restrictive.
The text was revised in the manuscript to make this clearer.

Will the definition of IgE-mediated allergies, atopic eczema or asthma be included in the final publication?

-> So far, we had not included a definition, but upon your question have now included further references, on which we have based our understanding of allergic diseases, in the study protocol.

Regarding Task 3: Please comment on whether or not there will be any bias and how this will be addressed. For example, it is possible that authors may collaborate to harness different expertise for a common goal, and this may not necessary be a conflict of interest.

-> We are not sure if we understood this comment correctly.
Ideally, a guideline panel should encourage authors from different areas of expertise that are relevant to the subject area of the guideline, as well as patients or citizens to collaborate. A diverse guideline panel facilitates the consideration of different perspectives and helps avoid possible distortions caused by secondary interests.
Conflicts that might arise from different expertise belong to the category of intellectual conflicts of interest, which we don’t see as severe. We are primarily interested in direct financial and personal interests, to what extent they occur and if they occur, how they are managed.
We hope this answered your question?

Minor comment in Introduction: suggest deleting “only” from this sentence “…children only achieved insufficient scores…”

-> Thank you for the suggestion, the text was changed accordingly.
Competing Interests: No competing interests were disclosed. Close
Report a concern

Comments on this article Comments (0)

Version 2

VERSION 2 PUBLISHED 10 Nov 2022

Open Peer Review

Reviewer Status

Reviewer Reports

	Invited Reviewers
	1	2
Version 2 (revision) 27 Dec 23	read	read
Version 1 10 Nov 22	read	read

Paxton Loke, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, Parkville, Australia
Nina Veetnisha Gunnarsson, Jönköping University, Jönköping, Sweden

Comments on this article

All Comments(0)

Add a comment

Browse by related subjects

Back to all reports

Reviewer Report

6 Views

17 Jan 2024 | for Version 2

Paxton Loke, Allergy Immunology, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, Parkville, Victoria, Australia

6 Views Cite this report Responses(0)

Approved

No further comments.

Competing Interests

No competing interests were disclosed.

Reviewer Expertise

Food allergy

I confirm that I have read this submission and believe that I have an appropriate level of expertise to confirm that it is of an acceptable scientific standard.

Respond to this report

Responses (0)

Back to all reports

Reviewer Report

4 Views

11 Jan 2024 | for Version 2

Nina Veetnisha Gunnarsson, School of Health and Welfare, Jönköping University, Jönköping, Sweden

4 Views Cite this report Responses(0)

Approved

I am happy with the changes made by the authors and I do belive that reducing the amount of documents will make this review stronger. This review will make a strong constribution to the topic.

Competing Interests

No competing interests were disclosed.

I confirm that I have read this submission and believe that I have an appropriate level of expertise to confirm that it is of an acceptable scientific standard.

Respond to this report

Responses (0)

Back to all reports

Reviewer Report

13 Views

15 Sep 2023 | for Version 1

Nina Veetnisha Gunnarsson, School of Health and Welfare, Jönköping University, Jönköping, Sweden

13 Views Cite this report Responses(1)

Approved With Reservations

This is a very innovative and interesting systematic review and synthesis of child allergy guidelines.

What is meant with immediate allergies? Clarify.
In figure 1, why were these countries included specifically and not others?
Population: infants up to one year? Rational behind this?
A replication of the study may be difficult, as there are many different analysis and tasks.
Time frame: from 2010, rational behind this choice?
Publication types: additional type of texts such as position papers, consensus statements etc, is this needed, and if, why?

Is the rationale for, and objectives of, the study clearly described?

Yes
Is the study design appropriate for the research question?

Yes
Are sufficient details of the methods provided to allow replication by others?

Partly
Are the datasets clearly presented in a useable and accessible format?

Yes

Competing Interests

No competing interests were disclosed.

Reviewer Expertise

Allergy, food allergy

Respond to this report

Responses (1)

Author Response

17 Jan 2024

Katharina Sieferle, Department of Public Health and Health Education, Pädagogische Hochschule, Freiburg, 79117, Germany

1. What is meant with immediate allergies? Clarify.

We have originally used the phrase immediate allergies and IgE-mediated allergies in the study protocol, both meaning type I hypersensitivity reactions. We have decided to now only use IgE-mediated allergies to prevent any possible confusion or misunderstanding.

2. In figure 1, why were these countries included specifically and not others?

This was originally decided due to feasibility reasons, expecting most English-speaking guidelines to originate from the included countries. After additional consideration, we have decided not to exclude other countries, and to instead include all available guidelines in English.
The search strategy has been updated and a new figure 1 has been included.

3. Population: infants up to one year? Rational behind this?

The topic of interest of the research group is allergy prevention in early childhood and infancy. The first year of life is an important time for allergy prevention, since many allergy prevention measures concern the duration of breastfeeding and (timing of) introduction of complementary feeding, which typically is recommended to take place in the first year of life.
To be included in our analysis, guidelines do not need to exclusively address children under 1 year of life but should make recommendations on the first year of life, or on interventions in the mother during pregnancy.
The text was changed in the manuscript to make this clearer.

4. A replication of the study may be difficult, as there are many different analysis and tasks.

This study is part of a German research group and is divided into three tasks. This study protocol covers the whole study with all included tasks. However, all tasks will be conducted and analyzed individually, making replication of the tasks easier.

5. Time frame: from 2010, rational behind this choice?

Even though as early as 2008 avoidance of common allergens to prevent allergies was no longer recommended, there was a lack of evidence on allergy prevention measures (Greer et al. 2008). The LEAP study was published in 2015, leading to a further evidence shift towards an early introduction of common allergens (Du Toit et al. 2015). With guidelines from 2010 to 2019, we aim to be able to see this resulting shift in recommendations and underlying evidence. Additionally, only valid guidelines should be included in the analysis. Many guideline-developing organizations have set timeframes for guidelines to be valid for after publication. Guidelines older than 2010 should therefore definitely not be valid anymore at the time of search.
We have included a more comprehensive rationale in the text.

6. Publication types: additional type of texts such as position papers, consensus statements etc, is this needed, and if, why?

Thank you for this question/suggestion.
After additional consideration, we have decided to only include Clinical Practice Guidelines and Food-based Dietary Guidelines that make recommendations on Early Childhood Allergy Prevention, to compare these two publication types.
Eligibility criteria were changed accordingly in the manuscript.

View more View less

Competing Interests

No competing interests were disclosed.

Back to all reports

Reviewer Report

21 Views

12 Sep 2023 | for Version 1

Paxton Loke, Allergy Immunology, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, Parkville, Victoria, Australia

21 Views Cite this report Responses(1)

Approved With Reservations

This is an interesting study proposal in particular the conflict of interest aspect. Below are a few comments for clarification.

The search strategy in Figure 1 did not include Asia or Asian countries. Please comment on why these countries are excluded.
Please comment on including German publications and not any other languages besides English.
Population: Please comment on the rationale of including only infants up to one year and whether or not this may be overly restrictive.
Will the definition of IgE-mediated allergies, atopic eczema or asthma be included in the final publication?
Regarding Task 3: Please comment on whether or not there will be any bias and how this will be addressed. For example, it is possible that authors may collaborate to harness different expertise for a common goal, and this may not necessary be a conflict of interest.
Minor comment in Introduction: suggest deleting “only” from this sentence “…children only achieved insufficient scores…”

Is the rationale for, and objectives of, the study clearly described?

Yes
Is the study design appropriate for the research question?

Yes
Are sufficient details of the methods provided to allow replication by others?

Yes
Are the datasets clearly presented in a useable and accessible format?

Not applicable

Competing Interests

No competing interests were disclosed.

Reviewer Expertise

Food allergy

Respond to this report

Responses (1)

Author Response

17 Jan 2024

Katharina Sieferle, Department of Public Health and Health Education, Pädagogische Hochschule, Freiburg, 79117, Germany

The search strategy in Figure 1 did not include Asia or Asian countries. Please comment on why these countries are excluded.

-> This was originally decided due to feasibility reasons, expecting most English-speaking guidelines to originate from the included countries. After additional consideration, we have decided not to exclude Asian countries or other countries, and to instead include all available guidelines in English.
The search strategy has been updated and a new figure 1 has been included.

Please comment on including German publications and not any other languages besides English.

-> We included German guidelines because this study is part of a German research group on Public Health, making the German perspective especially relevant.
Besides German, only guidelines in English were included, due to feasibility and limited resources.

Population: Please comment on the rationale of including only infants up to one year and whether or not this may be overly restrictive.

-> The topic of interest of the research group is allergy prevention in early childhood and infancy. The first year of life is an important time for allergy prevention, since many allergy prevention measures concern the duration of breastfeeding and (timing of) introduction of complementary feeding, which typically is recommended to take place in the first year of life.
To be included in our analysis, guidelines do not need to exclusively address children under 1 year of life but should make recommendations on the first year of life, or on interventions in the mother during pregnancy and breastfeeding. We therefore think this will not be too restrictive.
The text was revised in the manuscript to make this clearer.

Will the definition of IgE-mediated allergies, atopic eczema or asthma be included in the final publication?

-> So far, we had not included a definition, but upon your question have now included further references, on which we have based our understanding of allergic diseases, in the study protocol.

Regarding Task 3: Please comment on whether or not there will be any bias and how this will be addressed. For example, it is possible that authors may collaborate to harness different expertise for a common goal, and this may not necessary be a conflict of interest.

-> We are not sure if we understood this comment correctly.
Ideally, a guideline panel should encourage authors from different areas of expertise that are relevant to the subject area of the guideline, as well as patients or citizens to collaborate. A diverse guideline panel facilitates the consideration of different perspectives and helps avoid possible distortions caused by secondary interests.
Conflicts that might arise from different expertise belong to the category of intellectual conflicts of interest, which we don’t see as severe. We are primarily interested in direct financial and personal interests, to what extent they occur and if they occur, how they are managed.
We hope this answered your question?

Minor comment in Introduction: suggest deleting “only” from this sentence “…children only achieved insufficient scores…”

-> Thank you for the suggestion, the text was changed accordingly.

View more View less

Competing Interests

No competing interests were disclosed.

Alongside their report, reviewers assign a status to the article:

Approved - the paper is scientifically sound in its current form and only minor, if any, improvements are suggested

Approved with reservations - A number of small changes, sometimes more significant revisions are required to address specific details and improve the papers academic merit.

Not approved - fundamental flaws in the paper seriously undermine the findings and conclusions

[1] 1. Johansson S, Bieber T, Dahl R, et al.: Revised nomenclature for allergy for global use: Report of the Nomenclature Review Committee of the World Allergy Organization, October 2003.J. Allergy Clin. Immunol. 2004; 113(5): 832–836. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0091674904009303

[2] 2. Pawankar R, Canonica GW, Holgate ST, et al., editors. The WAO White Book on Allergy (Update 2013) 2013.

[3] 3. Pawankar R: Allergic diseases and asthma: a global public health concern and a call to action. World Allergy Organ J. 2014; 7(1): 12. [published Online First: 19 June 2014]. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[4] 4. Lack G: Epidemiologic risks for food allergy. J. Allergy Clin. Immunol. 2008; 121(6): 1331–1336. Publisher Full Text

[5] 5. Ierodiakonou D, Garcia-Larsen V, Logan A, et al.: Timing of Allergenic Food Introduction to the Infant Diet and Risk of Allergic or Autoimmune Disease: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis. JAMA. 2016; 316(11): 1181–1192. Publisher Full Text

[6] 6. de Silva D , Halken S, Singh C, et al.: Preventing food allergy in infancy and childhood: Systematic review of randomised controlled trials. Pediatr. Allergy Immunol. 2020.

[7] 7. Chalmers JR, Haines RH, Bradshaw LE, et al.: Daily emollient during infancy for prevention of eczema: the BEEP randomised controlled trial. Lancet. 2020; 395: 962–972. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[8] 8. Skjerven HO, Rehbinder EM, Vettukattil R, et al.: Skin emollient and early complementary feeding to prevent infant atopic dermatitis (PreventADALL): a factorial, multicentre, cluster-randomised trial. Lancet. 2020; 395: 951–961. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[9] 9. Roßberg S, Keller T, Icke K, et al.: Orally applied bacterial lysate in infants at risk for atopy does not prevent atopic dermatitis, allergic rhinitis, asthma or allergic sensitization at school age: Follow-up of a randomized trial. Allergy. 2020; 75(8): 2020–2025. Publisher Full Text

[10] 10. Graham R: Clinical practice guidelines we can trust. Washington, DC: National Academies Press; 2011.

[11] 11. Franz MJ, Boucher JL, Green-Pastors J, et al.: Evidence-based nutrition practice guidelines for diabetes and scope and standards of practice. J. Am. Diet. Assoc. 2008; 108(4 Suppl 1): S52–S58. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[12] 12. Greer FR, Sicherer SH, Burks AW: Effects of early nutritional interventions on the development of atopic disease in infants and children: the role of maternal dietary restriction, breastfeeding, timing of introduction of complementary foods, and hydrolyzed formulas. Pediatrics. 2008; 121(1): 183–191. Publisher Full Text

[13] 13. Du Toit G, Roberts G, Sayre PH, et al.: Randomized trial of peanut consumption in infants at risk for peanut allergy. N. Engl. J. Med. 2015; 372(9): 803–813. [published Online First: 24 February 2015]. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[14] 14. Arbeitsgemeinschaft der Wissenschaftlichen Medizinischen Fachgesellschaften (AWMF) - Ständige Kommission Leitlinien. AWMF-Regelwerk “Leitlinien”.1. Auflage 2012 2012. (accessed 27 Jul 2021). Reference Source Reference Source

[15] 15. Perkin MR, Togias A, Koplin J, et al.: Food Allergy Prevention: More Than Peanut. J. Allergy Clin. Immunol.: Pract. 2020; 8(1): 1–13. Publisher Full Text Reference Source

[16] 16. Qaseem A, Forland F, Macbeth F, et al.: Guidelines International Network: Toward international standards for clinical practice guidelines. Ann. Intern. Med. 2012; 156(7): 525–531. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[17] 17. Weishaar H, Dorfman L, Freudenberg N, et al.: Why media representations of corporations matter for public health policy: A scoping review. BMC Public Health. 2016; 16: 899. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[18] 18. Bindslev JBB, Schroll JB, Gøtzsche PC, et al.: Underreporting of conflicts of interest in clinical practice guidelines: Cross sectional study. BMC Med. Ethics. 2013; 14: 19. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[19] 19. Hansen C, Lundh A, Rasmussen K, et al.: Financial conflicts of interest and outcomes and quality of systematic reviews. Cochrane Database Syst. Rev. 2017; 365(9465): 1159.

[20] 20. Lundh A, Lexchin J, Mintzes B, et al.: Industry sponsorship and research outcome. Cochrane Database Syst. Rev. 2017; 2017: MR000033. Publisher Full Text

[21] 21. Shekelle PG: Clinical practice guidelines: What’s next? JAMA. 2018; 320(8): 757–758. Publisher Full Text Reference Source

[22] 22. Montagnese C, Santarpia L, Buonifacio M, et al.: European food-based dietary guidelines: A comparison and update. Nutrition. 2015; 31(7-8): 908–915. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[23] 23. Schünemann H, Brożek J, Guyatt G, et al.: GRADE Handbook: for grading the quality of evidence and the strength of recommendations using the GRADE approach.2013. Accessed April 06, 2020. Reference Source

[24] 24. Bhatt M, Nahari A, Wang P-W, et al.: The quality of clinical practice guidelines for management of pediatric type 2 diabetes mellitus: a systematic review using the AGREE II instrument. Syst. Rev. 2018; 7(1): 193. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[25] 25. Chiappini E, Bortone B, Galli L, et al.: Guidelines for the symptomatic management of fever in children: systematic review of the literature and quality appraisal with AGREE II. BMJ Open. 2017; 7(7): e015404. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[26] 26. Neuman J, Korenstein D, Ross JS, et al.: Prevalence of financial conflicts of interest among panel members producing clinical practice guidelines in Canada and United States: Cross sectional study. BMJ. 2011; 343: d5621. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[27] 27. Garza C, Stover PJ, Ohlhorst SD, et al.: Best practices in nutrition science to earn and keep the public's trust. Am. J. Clin. Nutr. 2019; 109(1): 225–243. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[28] 28. Lo B, Field MJ: Conflict of interest in medical research, education, and practice. Washington D.C.: National Academies Press; 2009.

[29] 29. Thompson DF: Understanding financial conflicts of interest. N. Engl. J. Med. 1993; 329(8): 573–576. Publisher Full Text

[30] 30. Schünemann HJ, Al-Ansary LA, Forland F, et al.: Guidelines International Network: Principles for disclosure of interests and management of conflicts in guidelines. Ann. Intern. Med. 2015; 163(7): 548–553. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[31] 31. van Tulleken C : Overdiagnosis and industry influence: how cow’s milk protein allergy is extending the reach of infant formula manufacturers. BMJ. 2018; 363: k5056. Publisher Full Text Reference Source

[32] 32. Chartres N, Fabbri A, Bero LA: Association of industry sponsorship with outcomes of nutrition studies: A systematic review and meta-analysis. JAMA Intern. Med. 2016; 176(12): 1769–1777. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[33] 33. Mozaffarian D, Forouhi NG: Dietary guidelines and health-is nutrition science up to the task? BMJ. 2018; 360: k822. Publisher Full Text

[34] 34. Moynihan R, Lai A, Jarvis H, et al.: Undisclosed financial ties between guideline writers and pharmaceutical companies: a cross-sectional study across 10 disease categories. BMJ Open. 2019; 9(2): e025864. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[35] 35. Norris SL, Holmer HK, Ogden LA, et al.: Conflict of interest disclosures for clinical practice guidelines in the national guideline clearinghouse. PLoS One. 2012; 7(11): e47343. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[36] 36. Arbeitsgemeinschaft der Wissenschaftlichen Medizinischen Fachgesellschaften [AWMF]. [AWMF form for declaring interests in guideline projects].2018. Accessed October 02, 2018. Reference Source

[37] 37. Qaseem A, Wilt TJ: Disclosure of Interests and Management of Conflicts of Interest in Clinical Guidelines and Guidance Statements: Methods From the Clinical Guidelines Committee of the American College of Physicians. Ann. Intern. Med. 2019; 171(53): 309–388. Reference Source

[38] 38. Moher D, Liberati A, Tetzlaff J, et al.: Preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses: the PRISMA statement. J. Clin. Epidemiol. 2009; 62(10): 1006–1012. [published Online First: 28 July 2009]. Publisher Full Text

[39] 39. Blümle A, Sow D, Nothacker M, et al.: Manual systematische Recherche für Evidenzsynthesen und Leitlinien. Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg; 2019.

[40] 40. Canadian Agency for Drugs and Technologies in Health (CADTH): Strings attached: CADTH database search filters 2016. Accessed September 01, 2020. Reference Source Reference Source

[41] 41. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations: Food-based dieatary guidelines. Accessed September 01, 2020. Reference Source Reference Source

[42] 42. Brouwers MC, Kho ME, Browman GP, et al.: AGREE II: Advancing guideline development, reporting and evaluation in health care. CMAJ. 2010; 182(18): E839–E842. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[43] 43. Matterne U, Tischer C, Wang J, et al.: The evidence for interventions in early childhood allergy prevention – towards a living systematic review: protocol. F1000Res. 2021; 10: 235. Publisher Full Text

[44] 44. Newman ME: Scientific collaboration networks. I. Network construction and fundamental results. Phys. Rev. E Stat. Nonlinear Soft Matter Phys. 2001; 64(1 Pt 2): 16131. PubMed Abstract | Publisher Full Text

[45] 45. Newman ME: Scientific collaboration networks. II. Shortest paths, weighted networks, and centrality. Phys. Rev. E Stat. Nonlinear Soft Matter Phys. 2001; 64. Publisher Full Text

[46] 46. Zhao Y, Zhao R: Evolutionary analysis of collaboration networks in scientometrics. Scientometrics. 2016; 107(2): 759–772. Publisher Full Text

[47] 47. Popp J, Balogh P, Oláh J, et al.: Social network analysis of scientific articles published by food policy. Sustainability. 2018; 10(3): 577. Publisher Full Text

[48] 48. de Brún A , McAuliffe E: Social network analysis as a methodological approach to explore health systems: A case study exploring support among senior managers/executives in a hospital network. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health. 2018; 15(3). Publisher Full Text

[49] 49. Borgatti S, Everett M, Freeman LC: Ucinet 6 for Windows: Software for social network analysis. User's guide. Harvard, MA: Analytic Technologies; 2012.

[50] 50. Sieferle K: PRISMA-P checklist HELICAP WP1 (COI). figshare. [Dataset]. Journal Contribution. 2022. Publisher Full Text

Management of evidence and conflict of interest in guidelines on early childhood allergy prevention and child nutrition: study protocol of a systematic synthesis of guidelines and explorative network analysis

Abstract

Background

Methods

Ethics and dissemination

Keywords

Revised Amendments from Version 1

Introduction

Objective

Methods

Task 1

Figure 1. Search strategy.

Task 2

Task 3

Discussion

Ethics and dissemination

Study status

Data availability

Underlying data

Reporting guidelines

References

Comments on this article Comments (0)

Open Peer Review

Comments on this article Comments (0)

Open Peer Review

Reviewer Status

Reviewer Reports

Comments on this article

Browse by related subjects

Competing Interests Policy

Stay Updated