A quality assessment tool for diagnostic accuracy studies

The original QUADAS tool was developed through a collaborative project between the Centre for Reviews and Dissemination (CRD), University of York, and the Academic Medical Centre at the University of Amsterdam. It was funded through the HTA programme and was published in 2003.
Since its development QUADAS has been used in a large number of systematic reviews. A modified version of QUADAS, with items related to the quality of reporting removed, has been adopted for use by the Cochrane Collaboration and is recommended for use in all Cochrane DTA reviews.
The development of QUADAS-2 was led by a team based at the School of Social and Community Medicine at the University of Bristol.
QUADAS-2 consists of four key domains covering patient selection, index test, reference standard, and flow and timing.

The tool is to be completed in four phases: (1) summary of the review question; (2) developing review specific consensus on application of QUADAS-2 (addition of topic specific signalling questions; developing rating guidelines); (3) reviewing the published flow diagram for the primary study or constructing flow diagram if none is reported; and (4) assessment of risk of bias and concerns regarding applicability. Each domain is assessed in terms of the risk of bias and the first three are also assessed in terms of concerns regarding applicability.

Learn more about QUADAS by attending ECEBM standard workshops