Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2025 Jun 6;25(1):155.
doi: 10.1186/s12874-025-02610-5.

Adherence to STARD guidelines in miRNA diagnostic accuracy studies for hepatocellular carcinoma: a systematic review

Shuaiyang Wang #  1   2 , Mei Wu #  2 , Bei Xie #  3 , Xingyuan Ma #  1   2 , Jing Li  1 , Bin Ma  4 , Linjing Li  5
Affiliations

Adherence to STARD guidelines in miRNA diagnostic accuracy studies for hepatocellular carcinoma: a systematic review

Shuaiyang Wang et al. BMC Med Res Methodol. .

Abstract

Background: Accumulating evidence demonstrates that miRNAs exhibit enhanced diagnostic sensitivity and specificity compared to the conventional hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) biomarker alpha-fetoprotein (AFP), particularly showing promising clinical utility in early-stage HCC detection. However, insufficient transparency in methodology reporting compromises the validity assessment of these findings and hinders their translational applications. In this study, we investigated the adherence to the STARD criteria in studies investigating the diagnostic accuracy of miRNA for liver cancer. In addition, the quality of reporting was examined to identify factors influencing the quality of reporting.

Method: A comprehensive search strategy was performed on the PubMed, EMBASE, Cochrane Library, and Web of Science, as of March 30, 2023. Clinical trials investigating the diagnostic value of miRNA for HCC diagnosis were included in the analysis. The eligible studies were checked against adherence to the STARD criteria. Factors determining quality of studies were evaluated through subgroup analyses. All statistical analyses were performed using SPSS (varsion25.0).

Results: Sixty-two eligible studies, all published between 2010 and 2022, were eventually included in the final analysis. The results revealed a moderate overall adherence to STARD 2015, with an average of 12.1 (52.6%) of the 23 items reported. Subgroup analysis revealed that adherence to the STARD 2015 varied among countries (USA 58.7%;Egypt 46.5%)(p<0.05).

Conclusion: The quality of studies reporting the diagnostic accuracy of miRNAs in HCC was average and did not increase after the publication of STARD 2015. Our findings rise awareness regarding the need to improve STARD standards, implying that more journals need to include STARD standards for relevant manuscripts. In addition, editorial and peer approval procedures should adopt measures that will aim to improve reporting quality.

Keywords: Checklist; Diagnosis; HCC; MiRNA; Report; STARD.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Declarations. Ethics approval and consent to participate: Not applicable. Consent for publication: The authors agreed to publish. Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Flow chart of literature screening
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
The score of the reports
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Scatter plot for subgroup analysis
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

References

    1. Shlobin NA, et al. Reporting policies in neurosurgical journals: A Meta-Science study of the current state and case for standardization. World Neurosurg. 2022;158:11–23. - PubMed
    1. Zarei F, Zeinali-Rafsanjani B. Assessment of adherence of diagnostic accuracy studies published in radiology journals to STARD statement indexed in web of science, pubmed & Scopus in 2015. J Biomed Phys Eng. 2018;8(3):311–24. - PMC - PubMed
    1. White SJ. Systematic review of adherence to the standards for reporting of diagnostic accuracy studies (STARD) 2015 reporting guideline in cerebral aneurysm imaging diagnostic accuracy studies. J Clin Neurosci. 2023;115:89–94. - PubMed
    1. Choi YJ, et al. Does the reporting quality of diagnostic test accuracy studies, as defined by STARD 2015, affect citation?? Korean J Radiol. 2016;17(5):706–14. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Al Wattar BH, et al. Clinical practice guidelines on the diagnosis and management of polycystic ovary syndrome: A systematic review and quality assessment study. J Clin Endocrinol Metab. 2021;106(8):2436–46. - PMC - PubMed

Publication types

MeSH terms

LinkOut - more resources