Research integrity in clinical practice guidelines for pregnancy and postnatal care

Clinical practice guidelines rely on the integrity of published research to ensure their recommendations are valid. Research integrity represents a major challenge internationally, encompassing a range of concerns including spin in published research, selective reporting of results, fabrication of results and fabrication of studies. Research into pregnancy care has been identified by international efforts as an area of specific concern, with high levels of problematic studies for which the results cannot be confirmed potentially leading to incorrect conclusions in systematic reviews based on this evidence. In this project you will be supported by researchers in the Australian Living Evidence Collaboration (ALEC), embedded within Cochrane Australia. ALEC is a world-first collaboration that brings together leading experts in evidence synthesis and guideline development to build a next generation system for delivering reliable, accessible, up-to-date evidence in health. ALEC is currently leading the development of the LEAPP (Living Evidence for Australian Pregnancy and Postnatal care) clinical practice guidelines, a five-year project funded by the Australian Department of Health and Aged Care, in collaboration with over 25 professional and community partner organisations. Living guidelines are continually maintained, informed by ongoing evidence review for priority recommendations where uncertainty remains and the body of research is evolving. In this project, we aim to explore the impact of research integrity on the LEAPP guidelines, and the feasibility of integrating research integrity checks into the guideline development process. The work may include piloting of integrity assessment methods; investigation of research integrity assessment for non-randomised studies; evaluation of the impact of removal of problematic research on the conclusions of systematic reviews in pregnancy and postnatal care; and evaluation of the impact on guideline recommendations. Your work will have real-world impact on pregnancy and postnatal care in Australia and contribute to an important and growing body of international research in this area.