The goal of such analysis is to make recommendations for practice ranging in form from a simple recommendation to a comprehensive set of clinical guidelines or treatment protocols. The next level of knowledge synthesis is the statistical meta-analysis in which the findings of multiple studies that fulfill certain criteria for inclusion are collected and analyzed mathematically. Some go so far as to limit the use of the term and concept of knowledge synthesis to statistical meta-analysis. If enough qualifying studies are found, statistical meta-analyses are performed and are generally considered high level evidence of treatment effectiveness. In medicine, the Journal of Controlled Clinical Trials is the official journal of the Society for Clinical Trials.
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Subscription is required. This journal publishes all types of knowledge synthesis although most are systematic reviews and not statistical meta-analyses. The topics are selected for relevance to nursing practice. It is specific to cancer and contains peer-reviewed summaries and syntheses of literature on cancer treatment, screening, prevention, genetics and supportive care. The reviews are done by experts in the various fields.