Data Synthesis

Reported risk factors will be grouped into predefined domains, with new categories created when needed. Studies will be grouped by follow-up duration, with short, medium, and long categories defined as less than 5 years, 5 to 10 years, and 10 or more years. The protocol plans separate meta-analyses for randomized controlled trials and non-randomized or uncontrolled studies. The review will use structured narrative synthesis instead of quantitative synthesis of ICERs. Studies comparing Black and white subjective well-being will be synthesised separately and grouped by whether Black respondents report higher, lower or similar subjective well-being relative to white respondents. Standardised mean differences with 95% confidence intervals will compare results across validated instruments. Comparable studies with relative effect measures such as odds ratios or hazard ratios may be pooled if meta-analysis is possible. The review will mainly use narrative synthesis because broad scope and heterogeneity are expected. Meta-analysis will only be performed when at least three studies are sufficiently similar in infection type, outcome definition, and cohort classification. Heterogeneity will…