The impact of blinding on trial results: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Abstract Background Blinding—the concealment of the arm to which participants have been randomized—is an important consideration for assessing risk of bias of randomized trials. A growing body of evidence has, however, yielded inconsistent results on whether trials without blinding produce biased findings. Objective To conduct a systematic review and meta-analysis of the evidence addressing whether trials with and without blinding produce …