Fig 1.
PRISMA flow chart of literature search.
This flow diagram illustrated the search results and the process of screening and selecting studies for inclusion, and the reasons for exclusions in this review.
Fig 2.
The number of published pharmacoeconomic systematic reviews, 2000–2018.
This plot listed the number of pharmacoeconomic SR literature published in different years. The number on top of the bars represented the number of studies.
Table 1.
Characteristics of the included 165 systematic reviews.
Fig 3.
The methodological quality was evaluated by the modified AMSTAR scale in the pharmacoeconomic systematic review.
This plot illustrated the quality of included studies with each judgment ("yes" (score 1), "no" (score 0) and "impossible to judge" (score 0.5)). The overall methodological quality was moderate. Three of the 10 quality items (item 3, item 6 and item 7) were fulfilled in at least 85% of reviews, while 2 items (item 1 and item 9) were fulfilled just about or less than thirty percent.
Table 2.
Summary of the existing checklist used in the pharmacoeconomic systematic review.