Interventions for preventing falls in older people living in the community.

Background: Approximately 30% of people over 65 years of age living in the community fall each year. This is an update of a Cochrane review first published in 2009.

Objectives: To assess the effects of interventions designed to reduce the incidence of falls in older people living in the community.

Long-term follow-up for mortality and cancer in a randomized placebo-controlled trial of vitamin D(3) and/or calcium (RECORD trial).

Context: Vitamin D or calcium supplementation may have effects on vascular disease and cancer.

Objective: Our objective was to investigate whether vitamin D or calcium supplementation affects mortality, vascular disease, and cancer in older people.

Design And Setting: The study included long-term follow-up of participants in a two by two factorial, randomized controlled trial from 21 orthopedic centers in the United Kingdom.

Different methods of allocation to groups in randomized trials are associated with different levels of bias. A meta-epidemiological study.

Objective: Insecure hiding of the treatment allocation in randomized trials is associated with bias. It is less certain how much bias is associated with different methods of treatment allocation.

Study Design And Setting: Meta-epidemiological study of 389 randomized trials from 19 systematic reviews and 65 meta-analyses with differing methods of treatment allocation.

Hip protectors for preventing hip fractures in older people.

Background: Hip fracture in older people usually results from a fall on the hip. Hip protectors have been advocated as a means to reduce the risk of hip fracture.

Objectives: To determine if external hip protectors reduce the incidence of hip fractures in older people following a fall.

Meta-analyses of small numbers of trials often agree with longer-term results.

Objective: Many systematic reviews include only a few studies. It is unclear whether recommendations based on these will be correct in the longer term; hence, this article explores whether meta-analyses give reliable results after only a few studies.

Study Design And Setting: Cumulative meta-analysis of data from 65 meta-analyses from 18 Cochrane systematic reviews was carried out.

Antibiotic prophylaxis for surgery for proximal femoral and other closed long bone fractures.

Background: Surgical site infection and other hospital-acquired infections cause significant morbidity after internal fixation of fractures. The administration of antibiotics may reduce the frequency of infections.

Objectives: To determine whether the prophylactic administration of antibiotics in people undergoing surgical management of hip or other closed long bone fractures reduces the incidence of surgical site and other hospital-acquired infections.

Interventions for preventing falls in older people living in the community.

Background: Approximately 30% of people over 65 years of age living in the community fall each year.

Objectives: To assess the effects of interventions to reduce the incidence of falls in older people living in the community.

Search Strategy: We searched the Cochrane Bone, Joint and Muscle Trauma Group Specialised Register, CENTRAL (The Cochrane Library 2008, Issue 2), MEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL, and Current Controlled Trials (all to May 2008).

WITHDRAWN: Interventions for preventing falls in elderly people.

Background: Approximately 30 per cent of people over 65 years of age and living in the community fall each year; the number is higher in institutions. Although less than one fall in 10 results in a fracture, a fifth of fall incidents require medical attention.

Objectives: To assess the effects of interventions designed to reduce the incidence of falls in elderly people (living in the community, or in institutional or hospital care).

Vitamin D and vitamin D analogues for preventing fractures associated with involutional and post-menopausal osteoporosis.

Background: Vitamin D and related compounds have been used to prevent osteoporotic fractures in older people.

Objectives: To determine the effects of vitamin D or related compounds, with or without calcium, for preventing fractures in older people.

Search Strategy: We searched the Cochrane Bone, Joint and Muscle Trauma Group Specialised Register, the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (The Cochrane Library 2007, Issue 3), MEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL, and reference lists of articles.

The Cochrane Collaboration: a leading role in producing reliable evidence to inform healthcare decisions in musculoskeletal trauma and disorders.

Systematic reviews are a key component of evidence-based practice. A valuable and accessible source of good quality systematic reviews on topics in musculoskeletal trauma and disorders is the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, published in The Cochrane Library. These reviews are produced by members of The Cochrane Collaboration, an international not-for-profit organization that aims to make up-to-date, accurate information about the effects of healthcare readily available worldwide.

Moving towards evidence-based healthcare for musculoskeletal injuries: featuring the work of the Cochrane Bone, joint and Muscle Trauma Group.

Due to their high incidence and associated morbidity and mortality, musculoskeletal injuries place an enormous burden on society. For example, in the 2004 to 2005 period 62,000 people with hip fracture accounted for 2.9% of the total number of hospital bed days in England.

Adjustment of meta-analyses on the basis of quality scores should be abandoned.

Objective: To find if a particular quality score was better than others at validly scoring the quality of randomized controlled trials, both by examining the consistency of dividing studies into high and low quality and using a large study as a reference standard.

Study Design And Setting: Observational study of meta-analyses from the Cochrane Library. These had to have binary outcomes that included more than 10 studies, one or more of which randomized more than 500 people into each group.

Effectiveness of hip protectors for preventing hip fractures in elderly people: systematic review.

Objectives: To present the updated results of systematic review of the current evidence for the effectiveness of hip protectors from reports of completed randomised trials, and to explore the evolution of that evidence.

Design: Systematic review with meta-analysis.

Data Sources: Cochrane Bone, Joint, and Muscle Trauma Group trials register (January 2005), Cochrane central register of controlled trials (Cochrane Library Issue 1, 2005), Medline (1966 to January 2005), Embase (1988 to January 2005), and CINAHL (1982 to December 2004).

Finding current evidence: search strategies and common databases.

With more than 100 orthopaedic, sports medicine, or hand surgery journals indexed in MEDLINE, it is no longer possible to keep abreast of developments in orthopaedic surgery by reading a few journals each month. Electronic resources are easier to search and more current than most print sources. We provide a practical approach to finding useful information to guide orthopaedic practice.