Before you start your review, check existing reviews. These reviews:
Note: You will also need to check the systematic review protocol registries to make sure there isn't a systematic review in progress that is similar to yours.
Search Tips for Finding Existing Reviews
Has over 1.8 million individual records, some dating back to 1887, and includes abstracts from Psychological Abstracts back to 1927, Psychological Bulletin from 1921-1926, and all APA journals and the American Journal of Psychology back to their first issues. Corresponds in part to the print index Psychological Abstracts.
You can search for systematic reviews in PsycINFO in one of two ways.
In SocINDEX, you cannot easily limit your searches by methodology, so you'll need to use keyword searches to find review articles.
Start by adding the keywords for your topic, then add an additional line of terms to capture reviews... “systematic review*” OR "research synthesis" OR "synthesis of research" OR "meta analysis" OR "meta-analysis"
Also includes more than 107,000 full text non-journal documents indexed by the ERIC database. Approximately one-half of the entries in the ERIC database are to ERIC documents. Microfiche copies of ERIC documents, including those prior to 1996, are in the Collections Deposit Library (CDL) Microforms Collection at MCFICHE 4913.
In Education Source and ERIC, you cannot easily limit your searches by methodology, so you'll need to use keyword searches to find review articles.
Start by adding the keywords for your topic, then add an additional line of terms to capture reviews... “systematic review*” OR "research synthesis" OR "synthesis of research" OR "meta analysis" OR "meta-analysis"
Journal articles are indexed for MEDLINE using NLM's controlled vocabulary, MeSH (Medical Subject Headings). Citations are created by the National Library of Medicine, International MEDLARS partners, and cooperating professional organizations.
MEDLINE has worldwide coverage, but 88% of the citations in current MEDLINE are to English-language sources and 76% have English abstracts.
NLM provides free access to MEDLINE through PubMed.
Journal articles are indexed for MEDLINE using NLM's controlled vocabulary, MeSH (Medical Subject Headings). Citations are created by the National Library of Medicine, International MEDLARS partners, and cooperating professional organizations.
Corresponds in part to the following print indexes: Index Medicus, Index to Dental Literature, and International Nursing.
You can search for reviews in Medline in two ways...
1) Under the "Publication Type" limit, select both "Meta analysis" and "Systematic Review" (Image from EBSCO Medline)
2) Include Systematic Review as a search term. To be thorough, use a search phrase like...“systematic review*” OR "research synthesis" OR "synthesis of research" OR "meta analysis" OR "meta-analysis" (Image from Clarivate Medline)
You can search for systematic reviews in CINAHL in one of two ways.
Start by entering your search terms in the basic search box. Open the "Additional Filters" pop-up window; select "Systematic Reviews" and "Meta-Analysis." After you save (i.e., click on "Show") and close the pop-up box, check the boxes next to these two article types to activate the filters on the results page.
Note: the chosen filters will stay activated for your next searches until you click on "Clear all."
Click Advanced Search. Type in your search terms, and make sure "Review" is checked.
Use the search or advanced search from the top right corner. You can filter results by date, status, language, or topic.
To take advantage of special limiters for Compendex, (or Inspec or GeoRef) --- these three are searched together unless otherwise specified --- the other databases need to be turned off.
However, systematic reviews are not specifically labeled as a document type or as a treatment type in these databases. That means that you will need to use "systematic review" as part of the search statement to specifically look for that type of review.
For example: subject/title/abstract = seismic and retrofit* and "systematic review*"
Compendex To limit any subject search to a literature review:
Inspec To use the option to limit to a "General review,"
GeoRef There's no special treatment label.
To find systematic reviews in SciFinder, include the phase "systematic review" as part of a RESEARCH TOPIC search. For example:
systematic reviews of consumer anti-bacterial soaps
-As a subject index,
-As a citation index,
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