Dynamite plots in surgical research over 10 years: a meta-study using machine-learning analysis.

Purpose: Bar charts of numerical data, often known as dynamite plots, are unnecessary and misleading. Their tendency to alter the perception of mean's position through the within-the-bar bias and their lack of information on the distribution of the data are two of numerous reasons. The machine learning tool, Barzooka, can be used to rapidly screen for different graph types in journal articles.