STROBE and reporting observational studies in dermatology

Abstract

The STrengthening the Reporting of OBservational studies in Epidemiology (STROBE) initiative (http://www.strobe‐statement.org/) is a recent major development about which all who undertake and report observational research in dermatology should be aware.1 The STROBE criteria aim to assess and improve the quality of reporting of epidemiological studies, but are not necessarily a measurement of the quality of the research. Clarity of reporting is a necessary criterion of judging study quality. For example, if a small poorly designed study is clearly reported as such, then at least readers will be able to see its shortcomings, as opposed to being left to guess what exactly was done in the study. One of the challenges authors of scientific articles face is to ensure that readers will understand what was planned, what was done, what the key findings were and what the results mean, so that the research can be interpreted appropriately. In an international initiative, experts comprising methodologists, researchers and journal editors have, through an involved iterative process, developed clear guidance for authors on how to improve the quality of reporting of observational research. Specific checklists of essential items which should be reported for case–control, cohort and cross‐sectional studies have been developed.2Table 1 shows a combined STROBE checklist for reporting of these three types of studies. A recent extension of STROBE has been the development of STrengthening the REporting of Genetic Association studies (STREGA) to improve reporting of genetic epidemiological studies.3