Results suggested that all therapies had little to no effect on pain and other patient-important outcomes .
Our findings are inconsistent with major clinical practice guidelines ; the available evidence suggests no beneficial effects of any therapies that research ers have evaluated in r and omized controlled trials
BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Central poststroke pain is a chronic neuropathic disorder that follows a stroke .
Current research on its management is limited , and no review has evaluated all therapies for central poststroke pain .
[GRADE guidelines: 5. Rating the quality of evidence: publication bias].
In the GRADE approach , r and omized trials are classified as high quality evidence and observational studies as low quality evidence but both can be rated down if a body of evidence is associated with a high risk of publication bias . Even when individual studies included in best- evidence summaries have a low risk of bias , publication bias can result in substantial overestimates of effect . Authors should suspect publication bias when available evidence comes from a number of small studies most of which have been commercially funded . A number of approaches based on examination of the pattern of data are available to help assess publication bias . The most popular of these is the funnel plot ; all , however , have substantial limitations . Publication bias is likely frequent , and caution in the face of early results , particularly with small sample size and number of events , is warranted
Results suggested that all therapies had little to no effect on pain and other patient-important outcomes .
Our findings are inconsistent with major clinical practice guidelines ; the available evidence suggests no beneficial effects of any therapies that research ers have evaluated in r and omized controlled trials
BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Central poststroke pain is a chronic neuropathic disorder that follows a stroke .
Current research on its management is limited , and no review has evaluated all therapies for central poststroke pain .