Major deficiencies in health intervention research have been uncovered by a new study that found that nearly all recent trials involving schoolchildren were missing crucial information.
Analysis by University of Cambridge academics of 51 trials of physical activity interventions for children and adolescents conducted between 2015 and 2020 found “significant gaps” in how interventions were reported, meaning most of the studies were of “limited scientific use”.
Very basic information was often missing, with 62 per cent of studies failing to specify where the teachers had been trained, claims the study. The same proportion did not state whether the training had been adapted to meet teachers’ needs and skills, and 60 per cent did not mention whether teachers were trained in groups or individually.
When the 51 full trial reports and another 132 associated documents published across 33 academic journals were considered, only 2 per cent of published papers met the standard for including essential research information, as measured against a checklist, Template for Intervention Description and Replication, which was released in 2014.
