The Most Premature Babies PSP question verification form

The purpose of this Question Verification Form is to enable Priority Setting Partnerships (PSPs) to describe clearly how they checked that their questions were unanswered, before starting the interim prioritisation stage of the process.

The JLA requires PSPs to be transparent and accountable in defining their own scope and evidence checking process. This will enable researchers and other stakeholders to understand how individual PSPs decided that their questions were unanswered, and any limitations of their evidence checking.

Name of the PSP

The Most Premature Babies Priority Setting Partnership

Please describe the scope of the PSP

This PSP is focusing on the Most Premature Babies - those born less than 25 weeks’ gestation.

The scope of the Most Premature Babies PSP is defined as:

• Antenatal management to improve outcomes in infants born less than 25 weeks of gestation
• Resuscitation practices and provision of intensive care to infants born less than 25 weeks of gestation
• General management of infants born less than 25 weeks of gestation during their hospital stay
• Diagnosis and treatment of common conditions affecting infants born less than 25 weeks of gestation
• The impact of inpatient neonatal care on the physical and mental health and wellbeing of parents/carers of babies born less than 25 weeks of gestation
• The impact of inpatient neonatal care on the health and developmental outcomes of babies born less than 25 weeks of gestation.

The PSP will exclude from its scope questions about the following:

• Antenatal treatment to prevent premature birth
• Causes of premature labour
• Infants born less than 22 weeks’ gestation and more than 24 weeks’ completed gestation
• The care of babies born less than 25 weeks’ gestation after they have been discharged from hospital
• Babies born less than 25 weeks’ gestation in low- and middle-income countries.

Please provide a brief overview of your approach to checking whether the questions were unanswered

The evidence-checking process was limited to full text systematic reviews and Cochrane reviews published in English within the last 10yrs. After screening all titles and abstracts, the remaining relevant full texts were analysed.

Questions were considered unanswered if there was no systematic review addressing said question. In cases where a summary question was addressed within the literature, but clearly stated low quality evidence, the summary question was considered unanswered, with recording of the relevant reference.
Questions were considered answered if they were addressed in a systematic review which stated moderate-high quality evidence, and where the population of interest was infants born less than 25 weeks’ gestation.

Questions were considered partially answered if there was good quality evidence in extremely preterm (EP, <28 weeks’ gestation) infants, but unclear if it included, and was therefore applicable, to infants less than 25 weeks’ gestation. Questions were also considered partially answered if the evidence was conflicting.
In cases where it was unclear whether the summary question was adequately answered, the question and relevant references were reviewed by the wider steering group for consensus.

Please list the type(s) of evidence you used to verify your questions as unanswered

Systematic reviews
Cochrane reviews

Please list the sources that you searched in order to identify that evidence

Sources included Medline, Embase, the Cumulative Index of Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL) and the Cochrane Database.

A final list of unanswered questions were reviewed by the Steering Group Committee, with any potentially missed sources of evidence suggested.

What search terms did you use?

((extreme or extremely or 25 weeks).mp. or Infant, Extremely Premature/) adj2 (Neonat* or newborn* or infant or infants or baby or babies).mp.

AND

(systematic review* or meta-analys* or metaanalys* or meta-synthes* or metasynthes* or umbrella).ti,ab.

Please describe the parameters of the search (eg time limits, excluded sources, country/language) and the rationale for any limitations

Papers written in English and published within the last 10yrs. This time limit was chosen in order to ensure that only the most up to date evidence was applied.

Names of individuals who undertook the evidence checking

Stacey Peart

On what date was the question verification process completed?

23/08/2023

Any other relevant information

n/a