Are you considering taking on a systematic review? Before deciding, it is prudent to see If a systematic review of your topic has already been conducted. You can search databases for published systematic reviews and registries for systematic review protocols. For example:
Systematic Reviews:
Protocol Registries:
That all depends on your research question. In the health sciences, MEDLINE (available through PubMed), Embase, and Scopus are top recommendations. However, you have access to dozens of bibliographic databases; your selection will depend on your topic. These databases are primarily composed of journal articles. If you are including other content types, like gray literature, you will need to search other sources as well.
Start with a written plan for searching the databases. For systematic reviews, an advanced or expert search strategy should be used. Each database has a specialized vocabulary and syntax.
PubMed:
Embase:
PICO METHOD
P: Population, Patient, or Problem |
How would you describe a group of patients similar to yours? What are the most important characteristics of the patient? What is the condition or disease you are interested in? |
I: Intervention, Prognostic Factor, Exposure |
What main intervention or exposure you are considering? What do you want to do with the patient? What is the main alternative being considered? |
C: Comparison |
What is the main alternative to compare with the intervention? Are you trying to decide between two drugs, etc.? It can be none or placebo. |
O: Outcome |
What are you trying to accomplish, measure, or affect? Can be disease-centered or patient-centered? |
T: Time* |
How much time does it take to demonstrate the clinical outcome? How long does it take for an intervention to achieve its outcome? How long are participants observed? |
Forming a Clinical Question
Credit: Lauren Fletcher, Rowland Medical Library
Keywords
Concept |
Teenager |
Heart Attack |
Advertisements |
---|---|---|---|
Related Terms |
AdolescentYoung Adult |
Myocardial InfarctionCardiovascular Stroke |
marketingcommercials |
Index Terms
Common Databases with Index Terms
Term |
Teenager |
Heat Attack |
---|---|---|
MeSH |
"Adolescent"[Mesh] |
"Myocardial Infarction"[Mesh] |
Emtree |
'adolescent'/exp |
'heart infarction'/exp |
CINAHL Headings |
(MH: "Adolescence") |
(MH "Myocardial Infarction") |
Ma, LL., Wang, YY., Yang, ZH. et al. Methodological quality (risk of bias) assessment tools for primary and secondary medical studies: what are they and which is better?. Military Med Res 7, 7 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40779-020-00238-8