Plotting the forest plots and funnel plots for meta-analysis

The forest plot is the most important data visualization in a meta-analysis, as discussed in the previous chapter. So, when choosing which Python package to use for meta-analysis, one of the first aspects to observe (of course, in addition to the validity of the package) is its forest plot data visualization potential.

The coding part is very simple: we will use the figure.forest() and figure.funnel() functions to create the forest and funnel plots. Keep in mind that we previously defined figure = PMA.Fig() as the function to be called:

# Show forest plot (as seen in the Figure 13.9)
figure.forest(results).show()
# Show funnel plot
figure.funnel(results).show()

Here is the resulting forest plot for the overall evidence synthesis.

Figure 13.8 – The forest plot

By observing the forest plot, we can evaluate both the individual studies’ difference and the overall effect, represented...