Mega-map of systematic reviews and evidence and gap maps on the interventions to improve child well-being in low- and middle-income countries

Exploring health equity in Lesotho's Child Grants Programme

Despite their growing popularity, little is known about how cash transfers (CTs) can affect health equity in targeted communities. Lesotho's Child Grants Programme (CGP) is an unconditional CT targeting poor and vulnerable households with children. Started in 2009, the CGP is one of Lesotho's key programmes in developing the country's social protection system. Using the CGP's early phases as a case study, this research aims to capture how programme stakeholders understood and operationalized the concept of health equity in Lesotho's CGP. The qualitative analysis relied on the triangulation of findings from a desk review and semi-structured key informant interviews with programme stakeholders. The programme documents were coded deductively and the interview transcripts inductively. Both materials were analysed thematically before triangulating their findings. We explored determining factors for differences or disagreements within a theme according to the programme's chronology, the stakeholders' affiliations and their role(s) in the CGP. The definitions of health equity in the context of the CGP reflected an awareness among stakeholders of these issues and their determinants but also the challenges raised by the complex (or even debated) nature of the concept. The most common definition of this concept focused on children's access to health services for the most disadvantaged households, suggesting a narrow, targeted approach to health equity as targeting disadvantages. Yet, even the most common definition of this concept was not fully translated into the programme, especially in the day-to-day operations and reporting at the local level. This operationalization gap affected the study of selected health spillover effects of the CGP on health equity and might have undermined other programme impacts related to specific health disadvantages or gaps. As equity objectives become more prominent in CTs, understanding their meaning and translation into concrete, observable and measurable applications in programmes are essential to support impact.

Child and adolescent mental health and psychosocial support interventions: An evidence and gap map of low- and middle-income countries

Background

Mental disorders affect about one in seven children and adolescents worldwide. Investment in effective child and adolescent mental health prevention, promotion and care is essential. To date, however, the evidence from this field is yet to be comprehensively collected and mapped.

Objectives

The objective of this evidence and gap map (EGM) is to provide an overview of the existing evidence on the effectiveness of interventions aimed at promoting mental health and reducing or preventing mental health conditions among children and adolescents in lower-middle-income countries (LMICs).

Search Methods

We searched for studies from a wide range of bibliographic databases, libraries and websites. All searches were conducted in December 2021 and covered the period between 2010 and 2021.

Selection Criteria

We included evidence on the effectiveness of any Mental Health and Psychosocial Support (MHPSS) interventions targeting children and adolescents from 0 to 19 years of age in LMICs. The map includes systematic reviews and effectiveness studies in the form of randomised control trials and quasi-experimental studies, and mixed-methods studies with a focus on intervention effectiveness.

Data Collection and Analysis

A total of 63,947 records were identified after the search. A total of 19,578 records were removed using machine learning. A total of 7545 records were screened independently and simultaneously by four reviewers based on title and abstract and 2721 full texts were assessed for eligibility. The EGM includes 697 studies and reviews that covered 78 LMICs.

Main Results

School-based interventions make up 61% of intervention research on child and adolescent mental health and psychosocial support. Most interventions (59%) focusing on treating mental health conditions rather than preventing them or promoting mental health. Depression (40%, N = 282) was the most frequently researched outcome sub-domain analysed by studies and reviews, followed by anxiety disorders (32%, N = 225), well-being (21%, N = 143), and post-traumatic stress disorder (18%, N = 125). Most included studies and reviews investigated the effectiveness of mental health and psychosocial support interventions in early (75%, N = 525) and late adolescence (64%, N = 448).

Conclusions

The body of evidence in this area is complex and it is expanding progressively. However, research on child and adolescent MHPSS interventions is more reactive than proactive, with most evidence focusing on addressing mental health conditions that have already arisen rather than preventing them or promoting mental health. Future research should investigate the effectiveness of digital mental health interventions for children and adolescents as well as interventions to address the mental health and psychosocial needs of children in humanitarian settings. Research on early childhood MHPSS interventions is urgently needed. MHPSS research for children and adolescents lacks diversity. Research is also needed to address geographical inequalities at the regional and national level. Important questions also remain on the quality of the available research-is child and adolescent MHPSS intervention research locally relevant, reliable, well-designed and conducted, accessible and innovative? Planning research collaborations with decision-makers and involving experts by experience in research is essential.

Common Elements Approaches to Implementation Research and Practice: Methods and Integration with Intervention Science

We propose that common elements approaches can advance implementation research and practice and facilitate pragmatic use of intervention and implementation evidence. Common elements are practices or processes frequently shared by interventions or implementations. Traditional common elements methodologies use synthesis, distillation, and statistics to describe and evaluate the merit of common ingredients in effective interventions. Recent developments include identifying and testing common configurations of elements, processes, and context variables across the literature of effective interventions and implementations. While common elements thinking has grown popular in intervention science, it has rarely been utilized in implementation science, and specifically, combined with the intervention literature. The goals of this conceptual methodology paper are to (1) provide an overview of the common elements concept and how it may advance implementation research and usability for practice, (2) give a step-by-step guide to systematic common elements reviews that synthesizes and distills the intervention and implementation literature together, and (3) offer recommendations for advancing element-level evidence in implementation science. A narrative review of the common elements literature was conducted with attention to applications to implementation research. A six-step guide to using an advanced common elements methodology was provided. Examples of potential results are presented, along with a review of the implications for implementation research and practice. Finally, we reviewed methodological limitations in current common elements approaches, and identified steps towards realizing their potential. Common elements methodologies can (a) synthesize and distill the implementation science literature into practical applications, (b) generate evidence-informed hypotheses about key elements and determinants in implementation and intervention processes and mechanisms, and (c) promote evidence-informed precision tailoring of intervention and implementation to context. To realize this potential, common elements approaches need improved reporting of details from both successful and unsuccessful intervention and implementation research, more data availability, and more testing and investigation of causal processes and mechanisms of change from diverse theories.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s43477-023-00077-4.

Understanding the use of evidence in the WHO Classification of Tumours: a protocol for an evidence gap map of the classification of tumours of the lung

INTRODUCTION

There are gaps in the evidence base of tumour classification despite being essential for cancer diagnosis, treatment and patient care. The WHO in charge of the production of an updated international classification, the WHO Classification of Tumours (WCT), aims to adapt evidence gap map (EGM) methodology to inform future editions of the WCT, by providing a visual summary of the existing evidence.

METHODS AND ANALYSIS

Bibliographical references used in the WCT fifth edition of Tumours of the Lung (Thoracic Tumours volume) will be used as search results of a literature search. A descriptive analysis of the cited evidence for tumour types and descriptors will be drafted and plotted in EPPI-Reviewer to develop a visual evidence map. The resulting EGM will reflect the number of cited studies in the size of the spheres, and the level of evidence by applying a four-colour code (red=low level evidence, orange=moderate level, green=high level and blue=unclassifiable). Overview of the findings will be provided in narrative form and a report will discuss the overall stage of cited research in the WCT and will include analysis of gaps, under-researched categories of tumour descriptors and pockets of low-level evidence.

ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION

No ethics approval will be required as this is a study of previously published material. Findings of the EGM will be published and used to guide editors, stakeholders and researchers for future research planning and related decision-making, especially for the development of future editions of the WCT.

PROSPERO REGISTRATION NUMBER

CRD42022302327.

PROTOCOL: Child and adolescent mental health and psychosocial support interventions: An evidence and gap map of low- and middle-income countries

This is the protocol for a Campbell review. The objective of this evidence and gap map is to provide an overview of the existing evidence on the effectiveness of interventions aimed at promoting mental health and reducing or preventing mental health conditions among children and adolescents in low- and middle-income countries.