Diagnostic utility of Computed Tomography Angiography (CTA) in the triage of patients with acute chest pain of suspected cardiac origin: An overview and a critical appraisal of a recently conducted systematic review and meta-analysis

The current text provides a brief overview and a methodological appraisal of the systematic review and metaanalysis conducted by Samad and colleagues (2012) who assessed the clinical utility and diagnostic accuracy of CTA for the diagnosis of acute coronary syndrome (ACS) in low to intermediate risk patients presenting to the emergency department (ED) with acute chest pain of suspected cardiac origin. In order to assess the methodological quality of the review, we retrieved the original papers and carefully examined the primary data and the review process using a number of methodological assessment tools such as the QUADAS 2, the STARD and an adapted version of the PRISMA checklists. Here we report on the results from our appraisal and discuss, taking into consideration the findings from previous meta-analyses, whether the presented evidence is sufficient and reliable enough to enable policy decisions and inform changes in the current clinical practice.