Core GRADE 6: Presenting the evidence in summary of findings tables

Abstract

This sixth article in a seven part series presents the Core GRADE (Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation) approach to summary of findings tables. These tables provide essential information about the effects of interventions on patient important outcomes, including relative and absolute effects, certainty of evidence, and a plain language summary. For binary outcomes calculating absolute effects requires applying relative risk estimates to baseline risks from studies representative of the target population. For groups of patients with very different baseline risks, summary of findings tables include separate rows with different estimates of absolute effects. For continuous outcomes, challenges arise when individual studies use different instruments to measure patient reported outcomes. Facilitating interpretation then requires providing details about units of measurement and minimally important differences.