Rapid network meta-analysis using data from Food and Drug Administration approval packages is feasible but with limitations
J Clin Epidemiol. Wang L et al.

Great to see this abstract!  Without the abstract I’m not sure how rapid ‘rapid’ actually is. Also, it’s unclear how close the results were, aside from the very nice ‘tease’ of:

“Compared to an NMA including all unique trials, we were able to generate reasonably precise effect estimates and similar relative rankings for available interventions…”

What’s particularly pleasing about this approach is because they avoided journal articles. I’m disappointed how the rapid review world is developing with most attempts focusing on – in effect – shortcuts from systematic reviews. There are other sources of data out there, often more reliable e.g. regulatory data from the FDA, EMA etc. I’ve used FDA data previously (Example rapid review: Brexpiprazole for schizophrenia v2), which resulted in this meta-analysis after about 90 minutes work:

Why we don’t routinely use this data is beyond me. Is it fear, imagination, worry of rocking the boat?

Rant over.