All items had a relevance score over 2.0, the set criteria for inclusion in the RAOS, and no items were excluded because of poor content validity The mean relevance score of all included items was 2.7 (range 2.4 – 3.0).
The indicators are ranked according to the mean relevance ratings of the patient group, showing the highest ranking indicator ("qualification of doctors") at the top of the list.
The limit set to justify inclusion of an item into the HOOS was set to a mean relevance score of above 2.0.
The mean relevance rating of NIHR HTA original research reports was 5.54 (95% CI 5.34 to 5.74), which was higher than non NIHR HTA original research publications, which had a mean relevance rating of 5.27 (95% CI 5.26 to 5.29) (mean difference=0.27, 95% CI 0.03 to 0.51, p=0.03; table 4).
The mean relevance rating of NIHR HTA-funded review reports was 5.46 (95% CI 5.32 to 5.60), which was similar to that for non-NIHR HTA-funded publications, which had a mean relevance rating of 5.41 (95% CI 5.39 to 5.43) (mean difference=0.05, 95% CI −0.09 to 0.19, p=0.46; table 5).
The mean relevance rating of NIHR HTA original research reports was similar to publications from the same studies publishing outside the HTA Journal, which had a mean average relevance rating of 5.57 (95% CI 5.36 to 5.78) (mean difference=0.03, 95% CI −0.32 to 0.26, p=0.875; table 4).
NIHR HTA-funded publications publishing outside HTA had an average mean relevance rating of 5.59 (95% CI 5.42 to 5.75), which was slightly higher than the rating for NIHR HTA reports (mean difference=0.11, 95% CI −0.10 to 0.32, p=0.419).
Three selected items from the subscale ADL A13-155, Table 1) had a mean relevance score of 1.3 1.7 but was selected because they are items included in the WOMAC LK 3.0.
NIHR HTA reports had an average mean relevance rating of 5.48 (95% CI 5.36 to 5.59), which was higher than the mean relevance rating for non-NIHR HTA publications passing CAP and MORE criteria, which was 5.32 (95% CI 5.31 to 5.33) (mean difference=0.16, 95% CI 0.04 to 0.29, p=0.01; table 3).
A Canadian study found that the mean methodological quality score (58 %, 95 CI 51%–65%) and the mean relevanCI score (76%, 951% 65%2%–80%) of the references were significandly lower then the acceptable score of 80% (p<0.05) [18].The poor rating for meanodological quality was prelevancebecauscore the citation of references to low-quality review articles and "other" sources [18].
