TrAnsparent ReportinG of studies Emulating a Target trial (TARGET) Guideline
The guideline was developed to support authors of observational studies aiming to emulate a target trial report their studies clearly and transparently. Use of the TARGET guideline should help readers, reviewers and journal editors evaluate studies emulating a target trial.
The TARGET statement document describes the processes used to develop the TARGET guideline and provides a minimum but essential checklist of items to report in target trial emulation studies.
The Explanation and Elaboration document will provide in-depth information on each item of the checklist to assist users of the TARGET guideline. The checklist is best used in consultation with the explanation and elaboration document.
The Checklist
The TARGET checklist contains the minimum information recommended to be reported in a manuscript of a study emulating a target trial.
Resources & Templates
TARGET Publications
- Statement
- Explanation and Elaboration (Coming Soon)
- Systematic Review
- Protocol
Templates
The TARGET Team
The TARGET guideline team includes epidemiologists, clinician-researchers, clinicians, statisticians, methodologists, industry-based researchers, psychologists, journal editors, science communicators and funders.
Steering Committee
Aidan Cashin
School of Health Sciences, Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of New South Wales (Australia)
Centre for Pain IMPACT, Neuroscience Research Australia (Australia)
Harrison Hansford
School of Health Sciences, Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of New South Wales (Australia)
Centre for Pain IMPACT, Neuroscience Research Australia (Australia)
Miguel Hernán
CAUSALab, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
Department of Epidemiology, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
Department of Biostatistics, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
Sonja Swanson
Department of Epidemiology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh (USA)
CAUSALab, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
Department of Epidemiology, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
James McAuley
School of Health Sciences, Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of New South Wales (Australia)
Centre for Pain IMPACT, Neuroscience Research Australia (Australia)
Members of the TARGET Team
Aidan Cashin
School of Health Sciences, Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of New South Wales (Australia)
Centre for Pain IMPACT, Neuroscience Research Australia (Australia)
Issa Dahabreh
CAUSALab, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
Department of Epidemiology, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
Department of Biostatistics, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
Barbra Dickerman
CAUSALab, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
Department of Epidemiology, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
Matthias Egger
Institute for Social and Preventive Medicine, University of Bern (Switzerland)
Population Health Sciences, Bristol Medical School, University of Bristol (UK)
Centre for Infectious Disease Epidemiology and Research, University of Cape Town (South Africa)
Xabier Garcia-Albeniz
Department of Epidemiology, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
RTI Health Solutions, Barcelona (Spain)
Robert Golub
Department of Medicine, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL (USA)
Harrison Hansford
School of Health Sciences, Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of New South Wales (Australia)
Centre for Pain IMPACT, Neuroscience Research Australia (Australia)
Miguel Hernán
CAUSALab, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
Department of Epidemiology, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
Department of Biostatistics, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
Nazrul Islam
Oxford Population Health, Big Data Institute, University of Oxford, Oxford (UK)
Faculty of Medicine, University of Southampton, Southampton (UK)
Matthew Jones
School of Health Sciences, Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of New South Wales (Australia)
Centre for Pain IMPACT, Neuroscience Research Australia (Australia)
Hopin Lee
University of Exeter Medical School, Exeter (UK)
IQVIA, London (UK)
Sara Lodi
CAUSALab, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
Department of Biostatistics, Boston University School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
James McAuley
School of Health Sciences, Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of New South Wales (Australia)
Centre for Pain IMPACT, Neuroscience Research Australia (Australia)
Margarita Moreno-Betancur
Clinical Epidemiology & Biostatistics Unit, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, Royal Children’s Hospital, Melbourne, VIC (Australia)
Department of Paediatrics, The University of Melbourne, Parkville (Australia)
Sallie-Anne Pearson
School of Population Health, Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of New South Wales (Australia)
Sebastian Schneeweiss
Division of Pharmacoepidemiology, Department of Medicine, Brigham & Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA (USA)
Melissa Sharp
Department of Health Psychology, School of Population Health, RCSI University of Medicine and Health Sciences, Dublin (Ireland)
Jonathan Sterne
Department of Population Health Sciences, Bristol Medical School, University of Bristol (UK)
NIHR Bristol Biomedical Research Centre (UK)
Health Data Research UK South-West, Bristol (UK)
Elizabeth Stuart
Department of Mental Health, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD (USA)
Sonja Swanson
Department of Epidemiology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh (USA)
CAUSALab, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
Department of Epidemiology, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA (USA)
Extensions to TARGET
We anticipate there may be extensions to TARGET developed to cover aspects of reporting not included in the main TARGET statement. These extensions will provide reporting guidance that are outside the current scope of “emulation of a parallel-group, individually randomised target trial with adjustment for baseline confounding.
There are currently no extensions in development, however, the TARGET team have identified several that may be necessary or helpful.
- Use of instrumental variables to overcome confounding
- Emulation of a cluster target trial
Developing a new TARGET extension
If you are interested in developing a new TARGET extension, or contributing to the development of one of those identified above, please contact the TARGET Steering Committee via targetguideline@gmail.com, or the contact form. The TARGET Steering Committee will consider your proposal at our next meeting (occurring quarterly).
Translations of TARGET
Translations of the TARGET statement and Checklist into Chinese and Japanese are underway. TARGET translations are conducted by volunteers and will be made freely available below.
If you are interested in translating the TARGET Statement or Checklist, please review the TARGET translation policy. and contact the TARGET Steering Committee via targetguideline@gmail.com, or the contact form.Feedback
We are committed to making TARGET as useful as possible and would love to know how you are using the guideline. Let us know how you’re using TARGET and any feedback you may have using this link - https://redcap.link/target-feedback