Systematic Reviews subjectId: 690687

• Systematic Reviews Guide [Calder Library]
• Data Services Librarian
• Writing Center 

PROTOCOLS AND REGISTRIES
Any researcher can register a protocol. If a publication or agency does not require one, submitting one is optional, but writing one as part of the process is fundamental. It helps plan and specify how you will navigate the systematic review process and stay on course.

• Systematic Reviews Protocols and Protocol Registries [National Institutes of Health (NIH)]
• Protocol Worksheet  [University of Iowa Libraries]
• PRISMA-P [PRISMA for Systematic Review Protocols]

---

HAS MY REVIEW ALREADY BEEN DONE?
It's important to know if the SR you're doing has been done already to avoid duplication. You can search protocols of SRs on the following databases

• PROSPERO
• Cochrane Library
• Campbell Collaboration
• DARE
• Trip

Apart from checking these protocol databases, search UM Library databases like PubMed, CINAHL, or PsycINFO.
 

---

FORMULATING A RESEARCH QUESTION
UT Systematic Review Guide [University of Texas Library]

SYSTEMATIC REVIEWS

• Joanna Briggs Institution Manual for Evidence Synthesis
• Systematic Reviews, Scoping Reviews, and other Knowledge Synthesis [McGill University]
• PRISMA 
  • PRISMA 2020 Checklist 
• Cochrane Training
  • Cochrane Interactive Learning Modules [UM Calder Library]
  • Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews 
• Systematic Reviews: Centre for Reviews and Dissemination (CRD) guidance for undertaking systematic reviews in health care [University of York, UK]
• Systematic Reviews: Skills to Develop Literature Searches, Manage Results and Evaluate Findings [University of Pittsburgh]
• Systematic Reviews: SR Process [University of Washington]
• Systematic Review Guide [University of Texas]

---

SCOPING REVIEWS

• Scoping Reviews: what they are & how to them [St. Michael's Hospital]
• Cochrane Training
  • Scoping Reviews: what they are and how to do them  [Videos]
  • Scoping Reviews: what they are and how to do them  [Slides]
• PRISMA
  • PRISMA-ScR [Scoping Reviews Checklist]
  • PRISMA for Scoping Reviews [tip sheets and video]
• Joanna Briggs Institution Scoping Reviews
• Current Best Practices for the Conduct of Scoping Reviews [University of Toronto]
• Scoping Review Guide [University of Texas Library]

• Overview of Primary Excel Workbook for Systematic Review
• Saving Search Strategies and Results in Primary Excel Workbook for SR 
• PIECES Workbook
• Equator Network 
• PRISMA Flow Diagram
• Tufts Systematic Review Guide
  • Download the Search Results Chart

Systematic Review

• Systematically and transparently collect and categorize existing evidence on a broad question of scientific, policy or management importance.
• Compares, evaluates, and synthesizes evidence in a search for the effect of an intervention. 
• Time-intensive and often take months to a year or more to complete. 
• The most commonly referred to type of evidence synthesis. Sometimes confused as a blanket term for other types of reviews.

​​Literature (Narrative) Review

• A broad term referring to reviews with a wide scope and non-standardized methodology. 
• Search strategies, comprehensiveness, and time range covered will vary and do not follow an established protocol.

​Scoping Review or Evidence Map

• Systematically and transparently collect and categorize existing evidence on a broad question of scientific, policy or management importance.
• Seeks to identify research gaps and opportunities for evidence synthesis rather than searching for the effect of an intervention. 
• May critically evaluate existing evidence, but does not attempt to synthesize the results in the way a systematic review would. (see EE Journal and CIFOR)
• May take longer than a systematic review.
• See Arksey and O'Malley (2005) for methodological guidance.

​Rapid Review

• Applies Systematic Review methodology within a time-constrained setting.
• Employs methodological "shortcuts" (limiting search terms for example) at the risk of introducing bias.
• Useful for addressing issues needing quick decisions, such as developing policy recommendations.
• See Evidence Summaries: The Evolution of a Rapid Review Approach

Umbrella Review

• Reviews other systematic reviews on a topic. 
• Often defines a broader question than is typical of a traditional systematic review.
• Most useful when there are competing interventions to consider.

Meta-analysis

• Statistical technique for combining the findings from disparate quantitative studies.
• Uses statistical methods to objectively evaluate, synthesize, and summarize results.
• May be conducted independently or as part of a systematic review.

* Adapted from Cornell University's A Guide to Conducting Systematic Reviews LibGuide.

Systematic vs. Scoping vs. Integrative Review [Duquesne University]

Munn, Z., Peters, M. D. J., Stern, C., Tufanaru, C., McArthur, A., & Aromataris, E. (2018). Systematic review or scoping review? Guidance for authors when choosing between a systematic or scoping review approach. BMC Med Res Methodol, 18(1), 143. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12874-018-0611-x 

Grant, M. J., & Booth, A. (2009). A typology of reviews: an analysis of 14 review types and associated methodologies. Health Information & Libraries Journal, 26(2), 91-108. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1471-1842.2009.00848.x 

• CINAHL Plus
  Primary index to the international literature of nursing and health.
• ClinicalTrials.gov
  Database of clinical trials sponsored by the National Institutes of Health, other Federal agencies and the pharmaceutical industry. Provides status of trials.
• Cochrane Library
  Collection of health databases providing independent evidence to inform clinical treatment decisions and other health related decisions.
• Embase
  Embase is a comprehensive biomedical literature database that provides over 30 million abstracts and indices from published, peer-reviewed literature, in-press publications and conferences covering the most important international biomedical literature from 1947 to the present day.It includes full-text indexing of drug, disease and medical device data, supported by the Embase thesaurus Emtree, which facilitates precise searching so users may find the answers they need to their research questions.
• Joanna Briggs Institute Evidence Based Practice (EBP) Database
  The Joanna Briggs Institute EBP Database allows you to search simultaneously, a wide range of summarized and appraised evidence, to inform your practice. This comprehensive range of resources includes over 3,000 records across seven publication types: Evidence Based Recommended Practices, Evidence Summaries, Best Practice Information Sheets, Systematic Reviews, Consumer Information Sheets, Systematic Review Protocols, and Technical Reports.
• MEDLINE (OVID)
  Comprehensive index to the international literature of biomedicine including clinical practice, psychosocial issues, health care administration, medical research, nursing, and more.
• PubMed - US National Library of Medicine, NIH
  Provides access to citations for biomedical articles from Medline and life science journals. Citations may include links to full-text articles.
• SCOPUS
  Covering the life, physical, health, and social sciences, Scopus is a large abstract and citation database of research literature and web sources.Scopus covers:  Over 15,000 peer-reviewed titles from more than 4,000 international publishers, including coverage of:  500 Open Access journals, 700 Conference Proceedings, 600 Trade Publications, 125 Book Series. More than 60% of titles are from countries other than the US Abstracts go back to 1966. References go back to 1996. 80% of content is indexed with controlled vocabularies. 100% coverage of Medline, including unique Medline journals. 28 million abstract records. 245 million references added to all abstracts. Scopus also covers 250 million quality web sources, including 13 million patents. Web sources are searched via Scirus, and include author homepages, university sites and resources such as the preprint servers CogPrints and ArXiv.org, and OAI compliant resources.
• Web of Science Citation Indexes
  Web of Science, published by Thomson Reuters, is a multi-disciplinary database that provides integrated access to over 8,000 key research journals indexed in: Science Citation Index Expanded, Social Science Citation Index, and Arts and Humanities Citation Index.There are two main ways to search the database: --- select General Search to search for articles by subject term, author name, journal title, or author affiliation --- select Cited Reference Search to search for articles that cite an author or article that you specify. Web of Knowledge features citation searching, email alerts, links to the full text of many items.
• Trip Medical database for Evidence Based Practice material: journals, guidelines, sys. reviews, etc.
  
• LILACS
  LILACS database is maintained and updated by educational, research and, health institutions, from government and private sector.

• Cochrane Library
  Collection of health databases providing independent evidence to inform clinical treatment decisions and other health related decisions.
• Joanna Briggs Institute Evidence Based Practice (EBP) Database
  The Joanna Briggs Institute EBP Database allows you to search simultaneously, a wide range of summarized and appraised evidence, to inform your practice. This comprehensive range of resources includes over 3,000 records across seven publication types: Evidence Based Recommended Practices, Evidence Summaries, Best Practice Information Sheets, Systematic Reviews, Consumer Information Sheets, Systematic Review Protocols, and Technical Reports.
• PubMed - US National Library of Medicine, NIH
  Provides access to citations for biomedical articles from Medline and life science journals. Citations may include links to full-text articles.
• Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality
  The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) publishes evidence-based information on health care outcomes; quality; and cost, use, and access.

Grey literature is information not commercially published.

"Grey literature stands for manifold document types produced on all levels of government, academics, business and industry in print and electronic formats that are protected by intellectual property rights, of sufficient quality to be collected and preserved by library holdings or institutional repositories, but not controlled by commercial publishers i.e., where publishing is not the primary activity of the producing body." 

From the Second International Conference for Grey Literature in 2010

To studies the many areas in public health, it is imperative to investigate some of the following sources for timely and research driven information:

• Reports from government agencies, organizations, societies, etc. (exp: CDC)
• Primary Resources: Manuscripts, Notes, Letters, Diaries, etc.
• Professional and Special Interest Groups
• Health Institutes
• Research Centers
• Conference proceedings
• Listservs
• Blogs
• Emails
• Newsletters
• Theses & Dissertations

For a full list of Grey Literature Documents visit GreyNet.org

• BioMed Central (BMC)
• BMJ (British Medical Journal collection)
• CADTH (Canadian Agency for Drugs and Technologies in Health)
• CADTH - Grey Matters
• U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS.gov)
• Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
• ClinicalTrials.gov
• Disaster Information Research Center
• Health & Medical Resources (Florida Atlantic University Libraries)
• Healthy People 2020 & 2030
• National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS)
• PEDro
• PubMed Central (PMC)
• Rutgers Government Information
• SciELO Open publishing model from Latin and South America.
• Sigma Respository
• World Health Organization (WHO)
• Trip Medical database for Evidence Based Practice material: journals, guidelines, sys. reviews, etc.
• WHO International Clinical Trials Registry Platform
• New York Academy of Medicine | Grey Lit Publishers List

• AIDS.gov
• AIDSource
• HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention Atlas
• NCHHSTP Atlas.

• Covid-19 Resources [Calder Library Guide]
• Covid End
• CDC Covid Tracker

• MedlinePlus - Health Disparities
• U.S. Department of Health - Office of Minority Health
• ethnoMED

SCOPING REVIEW PROTOCOLS

• Joanna Briggs Institute has guidance on scoping review protocols.
• Open Science Framework OSF is used to register scoping reviews.

SYSTEMATIC REVIEW PROTOCOLS

• PRISMA-P For reporting protocols.
• PROSPERO is used to register your systematic review protocol.
• Methodological Expectations of Cochrane Intervention Reviews (MECIR) MECIR provides a step by step checklist of standards with links to addtional information for conducting a systematic review or meta-analysis including the protocol.

• PRISMA PRISMA is a checklist used for reporting systematic reviews and meta-analyses.
• PRISMA Elaboration and Explanation Detailed instructions on using PRISMA.
• PRISMA-S A detailed extension of PRISMA used for reporting search methods.
• PRISMA for Abstracts A framework for condensing systematic reviews for a conference abstract.
• Methodological Expectations of Cochrane Intervention Reviews (MECIR) MECIR provides a step by step checklist of standards with links to addtional information for conducting a systematic review or meta-analysis

• Center for Evidence-Based Medicine
• Critical Appraisal Worksheets [Duke University Medical Center Library]
• JBI Critical Appraisal Tools
• Cochrane Risk of Bias Tool (RoB 2) (For randomized controlled trials)
• Mixed Methods Assessment Tool (MMAT)
• Newcastle-Ottawa Scale (NOS) (Non- randomized studies)
• Systematic Reviews
  • AMSTAR-2
  • ROBIS
• QUADAS-2 (For diagnostic studies)
• STROBE (For observational epidemiology studies)

Cochrane Interactive Learning is a an online course offered to all University of Miami Libraries users. Using the Cochrane methodology, the course is perfect for new and experienced review authors alike. It's a great introduction to systematic review for new authors while also offering more insight to the process for experienced authors. 

ON CAMPUS REGISTRATION  Download this step-by-step guide as PDF.

---

OFF CAMPUS REGISTRATION

To register for a Cochrane Account Off-Campus you must register with a UM email address 

• @med.miami.edu
• @rsmas.miami.edu
• @miami.edu

1. Go to https://training.cochrane.org/interactivelearning
2. Click New Users and Subscribers to register
3. On the course registration and subscription options page, the pricing information is for information only. You will not be charged. Scroll down to Institutional Access and click Please Log in or Create an Account.
4. If you already have a Cochrane Account, log in. Go to step 8
5. If you do not have a Cochrane Account, please click Sign Up Now on the account login page and complete the sign-up form. 

Please note that you should register for your Cochrane Account using the UM email address validated for access to Cochrane Interactive Learning.

6. Look out for an email titled 'Cochrane Account: action required' which contains a link to activate your account. Please check your junk or spam folder in case this is misdirected.
7. When you have activated your account, you will return to the Cochrane Interactive Learning registration page. 
8. You will see a notification that your email address has been validated and your registration enabled by your organization. No payment is required.

For instructions with images see this page.