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. 2022 Sep 27;19(19):12261.
doi: 10.3390/ijerph191912261.

Unclear Insomnia Concept in Randomized Controlled Trials and Systematic Reviews: A Meta-Epidemiological Study

Masahiro Banno  1   2   3 , Yasushi Tsujimoto  3   4   5 , Kunihiro Kohmura  1 , Eisuke Dohi  6 , Shunsuke Taito  3   7 , Hidehiro Someko  3   8 , Yuki Kataoka  3   9   10   11
Affiliations

Unclear Insomnia Concept in Randomized Controlled Trials and Systematic Reviews: A Meta-Epidemiological Study

Masahiro Banno et al. Int J Environ Res Public Health. .

Abstract

There are two possible ways to conceptualize the term "insomnia": insomnia disorder and insomnia symptoms, which are often poorly reported. The purpose of this study was to examine the proportion of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and systematic reviews (SRs) that mention insomnia in their abstracts and cannot distinguish between insomnia disorder and insomnia symptoms from the abstract. We included RCT and SR articles that included the word "insomnia" in the methods or results sections of their structured abstracts, published after 2010. We searched PubMed using English language restrictions on 10 March 2022. From 1580 PubMed articles, we obtained 100 random samples each for eligible RCTs and SRs. The unclear insomnia concept accounted for 88% of the RCT abstracts and 94% of the SR abstracts. Among the RCT and SR abstracts with unclearness, the concept of insomnia was unclear in 27% of RCTs and 57% of SRs after investigating the full text. The concept of insomnia has been unclear in many RCTs and SRs abstracts. The authors of RCTs and SRs are recommended to state "insomnia disorder" or "insomnia symptoms" in the methods and results sections of their abstracts.

Keywords: insomnia; meta-epidemiological study; randomized controlled trials; systematic reviews.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
PRISMA 2020 flow diagram. Abbreviations: RCT, randomized controlled trial; SR, systematic review [28].
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