Five questions before sharing a headline
Population, comparison, outcomes, harms and transparency: five places to start.
A practical way to read a trial without losing its limits.
Population, comparison, outcomes, harms and transparency: five places to start.
A reading guide
CONSORT 2025 guides complete, transparent reporting of randomized trials. For this issue, we propose five questions: who participated, what was compared, which outcome was measured, which harms and withdrawals were reported, and where are the registration, protocol and funding disclosures? This is an editorial adaptation, not the full CONSORT checklist.
Transparency is not certainty
The guideline helps assess how a trial is reported; it does not by itself certify its quality. An answer missing from an abstract may be in the paper or supplements. Look there before concluding that a detail is absent.
Professional context / Contexto profesional
Saving the clinical question and limitations alongside a reference makes a summary easier to correct and update later.
Evidence / Evidencia
An educational tool based on a trial-reporting guideline. It is not a validated risk-of-bias instrument.
Limitations / Limitaciones
It should not be used to automatically assign a quality score to a study.