Systematic Reviews
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2018. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Jul 21, 2018; 24(27): 3038-3054
Published online Jul 21, 2018. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v24.i27.3038
Systematic overview of hepatitis C infection in the Middle East and North Africa
Karima Chaabna, Sohaila Cheema, Amit Abraham, Hekmat Alrouh, Albert B Lowenfels, Patrick Maisonneuve, Ravinder Mamtani
Karima Chaabna, Sohaila Cheema, Amit Abraham, Hekmat Alrouh, Ravinder Mamtani, Institute for Population Health, Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar, Doha 24144, Qatar
Albert B Lowenfels, Department of Surgery and the Department of Family Medicine, New York Medical College, Valhalla, NY 10595, United States
Patrick Maisonneuve, Division of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, European Institute of Oncology, Milan 20141, Italy
Author contributions: Chaabna K, Cheema S and Mamtani R collectively contributed to the conception of the study; Chaabna K, Abraham A and Alrouh H were involved in the literature search, screening, and extraction steps; Analysis and manuscript drafting were implemented by Chaabna K with support from Cheema S, Lowenfels AB, Maisonneuve P, and Mamtani R; all authors read, edited, and approved the final manuscript.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
PRISMA 2009 Checklist statement: The authors have read the PRISMA 2009 Checklist, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the PRISMA 2009 Checklist.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Karima Chaabna, PhD, Institute for Population Health, Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar, Qatar Foundation-Education City, Doha 24144, Qatar. kac2047@qatar-med.cornell.edu
Telephone: +974-44928309 Fax: +974-44928333
Received: April 1, 2018
Peer-review started: April 2, 2018
First decision: May 17, 2018
Revised: June 10, 2018
Accepted: June 25, 2018
Article in press: June 25, 2018
Published online: July 21, 2018
Processing time: 108 Days and 16.6 Hours
Core Tip

Core tip: To achieve hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection elimination goals by 2030, precise prevention strategies targeting specific populations at higher risk of acquiring HCV infection and treatment programs require the development of evidence-based health policies. HCV infection epidemiology in the countries of the Middle East and North Africa was characterized in 37 systematic reviews (SR) during the last decade. Our systematic overview critically analyzes and synthesizes the findings of these SRs to map the evidence gaps in the region. Additionally, we assessed the quality of the reported outcomes and documented conflicts of interest of the SR authors who disclosed financial relationships with pharmaceuticals.