ReviewThe ultrasound journal2021
Reliability of ultrasound versus digital vaginal examination in detecting cervical dilatation during labor: a diagnostic test accuracy systematic review.
Review in The ultrasound journal, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed, 10 citations in OpenAlex.
- Membrane Status and Reliability of Intrapartum Transperineal Ultrasound in Cervical Dilatation Assessment.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Digital Examination vs. 4D Transperineal Ultrasound-Do They Compare in Labour Management? A Pilot Study.Diagnostics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Multitask Deep Neural Network for the Fully Automatic Measurement of the Angle of Progression.Computational and mathematical methods in medicine · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors at 3 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundThis systematic review aimed to investigate the reliability of ultrasound method compared with digital vaginal examinations in detecting cervical dilation.
methodsWe searched Cochrane (CENTRAL), MEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL, ISI Web of Science Core Collection, Trip Database, PubMed, DARE and NHS EED, HTA, and PROSPERO. Ten observational studies with a total sample size of 856 were included in the meta-analysis.
resultsThe intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) values ranged between 0.21 and 0.69. The fixed-effect models for the ultrasound test showed an average of ICC (r = 0.32 (95% CI 0.26-0.38). Correlation between two methods was poor (r = 0.359, 95% CI 0.26-0.44). In nulliparous and multigravida participants the correlation between ultrasound measurements and digital examinations was (r = 0.349, 95% CI 0.25-0.43) and ICC (r = 0.676, 95% CI 0.419-0.833), respectively.
conclusionTrans-perineal ultrasonography seems to be a reliable method for assessing labor progression in multigravida women, but its usage in nulliparous women needs further studies.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What Socratic holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.