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A comparison of the results of prospective and retrospective cohort studies in the field of digestive surgery

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Abstract

Purpose

We compared the results of prospective and retrospective cohort studies in the field of digestive surgery to clarify whether the results of prospective cohort studies were more similar to those of randomized controlled trials (RCTs).

Methods

We conducted a secondary analysis of the results to compare the results of RCTs with those of cohort studies in meta-analyses of 18 digestive surgical topics. The data from the prospective and retrospective cohort studies were combined. The summary estimates of each design were compared with those of RCTs. We used the Z score to investigate discrepancies.

Results

Twenty-nine outcomes of 11 topics were investigated in 289 cohort studies (prospective, n = 69; retrospective, n = 220). These were compared with the outcomes of 123 RCTs. In comparison to retrospective studies, the summary estimates of the prospective cohort studies were more similar to those of the RCTs [19/29 (prospective) vs. 10/29 (retrospective), P = 0.035). Five of the 29 outcomes of prospective studies and 6 of 29 outcomes of retrospective studies (P = 0.99) showed significant discrepancies in comparison to RCTs.

Conclusions

In the digestive surgical field, the results of prospective cohort studies tended to be more similar to those of RCTs than retrospective studies; however, there were no significant discrepancies between the two types of cohort study.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Community Medicine, Mie University School of Medicine, 2-174 Edobashi, Tsu, Mie, 515-3133, Japan

    Tomohiko Ukai

  2. Department of Family Medicine, Mie University School of Medicine and Graduate School of Medicine, 2-174 Edobashi, Tsu, Mie, 514-8507, Japan

    Satoru Shikata & Yousuke C. Takemura

  3. Department of Health Informatics, Kyoto University School of Public Health, Konoe-cho, Yoshida, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto, 606-8501, Japan

    Takeo Nakayama

Authors
  1. Tomohiko Ukai
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  2. Satoru Shikata
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  3. Takeo Nakayama
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  4. Yousuke C. Takemura
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Satoru Shikata.

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Conflict of interest

Takeo Nakayama received honoraria from GSK and advisory fees from Dainippon-Sumitomo Pharma, Otsuka Pharma, and Asahi Kasei Pharma. The other authors declare there are no conflicts of interest in association with the present study.

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No funding was received in support of this work.

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Ukai, T., Shikata, S., Nakayama, T. et al. A comparison of the results of prospective and retrospective cohort studies in the field of digestive surgery. Surg Today 47, 789–794 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00595-017-1479-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00595-017-1479-9

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