Comparison of the effectiveness of different umbilical cord care in infants: A protocol for systematic review and network meta-analysis

BACKGROUND: More and more studies were performed to explore the effectiveness of umbilical cord care practices. However, the results remain controversial. Hence, the aim of the review was to evaluate and compare the effectiveness of different umbilical cord care in infants through network meta-analysis. METHODS: A systematic literature search for relevant articles published in the English language will be conducted in PubMed, EMBASE, the Cochrane library, and Chinese Biomedical Literature Database from their inception to December 2018. Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) that compared the effectiveness of different types of umbilical cord care practices will be included. Cord infection, illness, and death will be used to assess the clinical effect. Risk of bias assessment of the included RCTs will be conducted by the Cochrane risk of bias tool. The WinBUGS 1.4.3 software will be used to perform the network meta-analysis and the result figures will be generated by STATA V.15.0 software. Grading of recommendations assessment, development, and evaluation will be used to assess the quality of evidence. RESULTS: The results will be published in a peer-reviewed journal. CONCLUSION: This will be the first network meta-analysis to evaluate and compare the effectiveness of different umbilical cord care in infants. Our study will generate evidence of cord care for infants and provide suggestions for clinical practice or guideline. PROSPERO REGISTRATION NUMBER: CRD42018118052.