Patients commonly present with acute pain secondary to an acute injury, and there are dozens of potential options for addressing their pain. Most trials explore the effectiveness of a treatment option versus placebo or sham therapy, which complicates assessment of comparative effectiveness among competing therapies. We will discuss the role of network meta-analyses to inform comparative effectiveness, despite limited evidence from head-to-head trials.

Insights:

  • An evolving approach for informing comparative effectiveness of competing interventions
  • Optimizing interpretation of effect estimates
  • Consideration of net benefit (benefits and harms)
  • Advantages of a partially contextualized approach to interpreting network estimates vs. surface under the cumulative ranking curve (SUCRA)

Keynote
Jason Busse DC, PhD
Associate Professor
Associate Director, Michael G. DeGroote Centre for Medicinal Cannabis Research
Anesthesia & Health Research Methods, Evidence, and Impact