Video: What tools can I use to conduct systematic reviews?

A systematic review is a type of research study that involves gathering, critically evaluating, and synthesizing all available evidence related to a specific research question or topic. It follows a structured and methodical approach to identify, select, and analyze relevant studies. begins with a comprehensive literature search across multiple databases, academic journals, grey literature, and other sources to identify all relevant studies related to the research question.  

Systematic reviews play a crucial role in advancing knowledge, informing practice, and promoting evidence-based decision-making across various fields of research and practice. Below are some of the factors why systematic reviews are important: 

1. They provide a summary of all relevant studies on a particular topic, helping researchers and practitioners to understand the state of knowledge in that area. 

2. They identify gaps in the existing literature or inconsistencies in study findings, highlighting areas where further research is needed. 

3. They help policymakers, healthcare professionals, and other stakeholders in making an informed decision, and create clinical guidelines and public health policies. 

4. They help avoid duplicative research and ensure that resources are allocated efficiently to address important research questions. 

5. They follow transparent and reproducible methods, allowing others to assess the validity of the review's findings and replicate the process if necessary. 

This video talks about some of the best tools to make your systematic literature process fast and accurate. The speaker of the video is Karel Patrek, who has a D. Phil. degree for his thesis on breast cancer. He has 40 years of academic and applied research experience, has published 100+ preclinical and clinical research papers throughout his career, and has reviewed and edited manuscripts in pharmaceuticals, biology, medicine, and related areas, including genes, proteins, peptides, and small-molecule drug development. Being a non-native English speaker himself, he is familiar with the issues researchers may have when drafting manuscripts for publication. He can advise on the content and structure of the parts of manuscripts, making text readable. He stresses the importance of adhering to the target journals’ content and formatting requirements when submitting a manuscript. 

[Transcript] 

What tools can I use to conduct systematic reviews? The following tools are available for the purpose. PubMed contains 35 million citations and abstracts of biomedical literature. Cochrane's independent network summarizes the best research evidence for making informed choices about treatment. Covidence offers a workflow platform to bring together all the global research and turn it into trustworthy summaries of scientific knowledge. Kambel Wiley Online Library publishes systematic reviews, evidence and gap maps, and methods research papers. Prisma, which stands for preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analysis, is an evidence based minimum set for reporting in systematic reviews and meta-analysis. Rayyan is a tool for reference screening process. And finally, Prospero is a database of prospectively registered systematic reviews in health and social care. Systematic reviews should be registered at inception protocol stage to avoid unplanned duplications.