Sightsavers Logo
Research centre
  • Home
  • About us
  • Research approach
  • Research studies and publications
  • Evidence gap maps
Join in:
  • Join in: Facebook
  • Join in: Twitter
  • Join in: Instagram
  • Join in: LinkedIn
  • Join in: YouTube
  • Global
  • Close search bar
    Donate
    • Home
    • About us
    • Research approach
    • Research studies and publications
    • Evidence gap maps

    Cataract evidence gap map

    Surgeons in an operating theatre

    What this map shows

    At Sightsavers, our EGMs summarise, appraise, and present evidence from systematic or literature reviews.

    The cataract EGM summarizes evidence from 98 reviews, of which six have been included twice as they report on two thematic areas (e.g. treatment as well as QCC). Of the 98 reviews, four are pediatric-related cataract reviews and 94 are age-related cataract reviews.

    The reviews are unevenly distributed across the sectors, with most addressing treatment of cataract (36), closely followed by clinical care (29) and risk factors and prevention of cataract (20). Very little evidence is identified in terms of access to cataract-related health care services (8), economic evaluations of interventions (3), epidemiology (5) and quality of life (3). Therefore, this gap map shows that there are clear gaps in evidence at the health systems sector level. No reviews are identified for cataract-related screening and quality of non-clinical care.

    A total of 46 reviews are of low confidence, of which 27 provide strong evidence in response to the research question they set out to answer. 29 reviews on the map are of medium quality, where the majority (19) show strong evidence in response to their research question. Finally, a total of 29 reviews are of high confidence; 12 of these provide strong evidence in response to their research question and another 11 provide weak evidence. Very few reviews provide weak evidence in response to author’s research question, regardless of confidence level.

    A special thank you to Dr. Baixiang Xiao for supporting in the review of studies written in Chinese.

    Find out more about the key messages from this EGM in our cataract evidence brief.

    How to read an evidence gap map


    Read our how to guide

    Read our how to guide

    How much detail would you like to see?

    Sectors
    Burden of disease
    Biomedical
    Service Delivery
    Health Systems
    Impact/Economic Evaluation
    Strength of Evidence
    Epi
    Risk
    Treat
    C.Detect
    QCC
    QNCC
    Access
    Workforce
    Financing
    Leadership
    HMIS
    Tech
    QoL
    Cost
    Strong
    3
    10
    15
    19
    6
    2
    3
    Inconclusive
    2
    6
    13
    2
    1
    1
    Weak
    4
    8
    8
    1
    • Share this evidence gap map (EGM)
    • : Twitter
    • : Facebook
    • : LinkedIn
    • Join in: WhatsApp

    Are we missing a systematic review?

    This evidence gap map was last updated March 2020.
    Help us keep this gap map up to date by sending us an email: gapmap@sightsavers.org

    Reference

    Sightsavers (2021). Cataract Evidence Gap Map [online] Available at: https://research.sightsavers.org/evidence-gap-maps/cataract-gap-map/ [Add date accessed]

    Our research is guided by our five year strategy

    Our research approach
    Sightsavers Logo
    Research centre
    • Join in:
    • Join in: Facebook
    • Join in: X
    • Join in: Instagram
    • Join in: LinkedIn
    • Join in: YouTube

    Protecting sight, fighting disease and promoting equality for all

  • Accessibility
  • Sightsavers homepage
  • Our policies
  • Media centre
  • Contact us
  • Jobs
  • Cookies and privacy Terms and conditions Modern slavery statement Safeguarding

    © 2025 by Sightsavers, Inc., Business Address for all correspondence: One Boston Place, Suite 2600, Boston, MA 02108.

    Our website uses cookies

    To make sure you have a great experience on our site, we’d like your consent to use cookies. These will collect anonymous statistics to personalise your experience.

    Manage preferences

    You have the option to enable non-essential cookies, which will help us enhance your experience and improve our website.

    Essential cookiesAlways on

    These enable our site to work correctly, for example by storing page settings. You can disable these by changing your browser settings, but some parts of our website will not work as expected.

    Analytics cookies

    To improve our website, we’d like to collect anonymous data about how you use the site, such as which pages you read, the device you’re using, and whether your visit includes a donation. This is completely anonymous, and is never used to profile individual visitors.

    Advertising cookies

    To raise awareness about our work, we’d like to show you Sightsavers adverts as you browse the web. By accepting these cookies, our advertising partners may use anonymous information to show you our adverts on other websites you visit. If you do not enable advertising cookies, you will still see adverts on other websites, but they may be less relevant to you. For info, see the Google Ads privacy policy.