Writing Search Methods for Systematic Reviews
Hey folks! It’s been a minute.
Along the same vein of past posts, I thought I would share my template for writing search methods for systematic reviews (and I tend to use the same template for other review types as well, though I leave that to your discretion). This template has been evolving over the years, so please don’t @ me if you find a publication where I left some of these things out! It’s been a work in progress (and tbh greatly improved by the publication of PRISMA-S by Rethlefsen et al in 2021).
Now you’re probably thinking “Um, Sarah, it’s just a paragraph” but I like to send my research team an entire package of information, which they can then slot into the Methods, Bibliography, Acknowledgements and Supplementary documents sections as applicable. I’ve found that keeping all of these things together increase the likelihood that everything is included in the manuscript at the end of the day (Supplemental tables for all the search strategies as run, I’m looking at you), ensure that I don’t forget any of these elements (I’m getting sweaty just thinking about it), and also make it easier for me to double check any manuscript drafts that cross my desk, without having to consult multiple documents or emails.
I’ve shared this template as CC0 Public Domain mainly so that you good folks don’t have to do mental gymnastics trying to figure out how to cite this in your own methods section. That said, I’ve included the PRISMA-S checklist in this template (with the authors’ permission - thank you Melissa!) and it is licensed (rightfully) under a different license, so please do cite/credit their work should you choose to use it. I’ve added language in the template to this affect as well.
Find any problems or want to suggest any additions to this template? Write to me!
Quick run down of the document:
Preamble
Here I let the team know that the document is intended to be chopped up/used in the appropriate places after one unfortunate incident where the team just appended my entire document as a Supplemental file (and I can’t quite remember because clearly I’ve tried to block it out, but I think it included my editorializations throughout - kind of embarassing).
Furthermore, I’ve also made all of my editorialization (that I want to direct to the team) in red, to make sure that it doesn’t accidentally get pasted into the manuscript (Hopefully not anyway. Fingers crossed).
Search Methods
Kind of self explanatory, but I provide a paragraph to be included in the Methods section, and a prompt to direct readers to the Appendices/Supplemental files for more information (this also handily serves as a prompt to the team to make sure said Appendices/Supplemental files get included).
I also like to use the PRISMA-S checklist to generate prompts in the Search Methods section for the team to write about any additional searching they may have done which I may not be aware of (e.g. “Citation searching”, “Contacts”, “Other methods” from the PRISMA-S Checklist).
Bibliography
Anytime I get my search peer reviewed, I cite McGowan et al’s 2015 guideline statement for PRESS, and want to credit other systematic reviews or search filters which I used or borrowed from to build my own search. Having this as a standalone section helps prompt the team to ensure these get included, and also provide a tidy list for me to check against when I’m reviewing the manuscript draft later. These often get left out by accident so it’s definitely something I need to remind myself to check every time.
Acknowledgements
Ditto this serves as a reminder to the team and a prompt to me to make sure it makes it into the final manuscript.
Supplemental Files
I provide tables for all searches as run (including trial registries, website searches, conference handsearching, etc). Want an example? Write to me! Happy to share for a project that has already been published.
PRISMA-S Checklist
I’ve found that adding Rethlefsen et al’s PRISMA-S checklist at the end of the document super helpful for me to go over once again after I think I’ve written everything out, because inevitably I’ve missed something.
References
McGowan J, Sampson M, Salzwedel DM, Cogo E, Foerster V, Lefebvre C. PRESS Peer Review of Electronic Search Strategies: 2015 guideline statement. Journal of Clinical Epidemiology. 2016;75:40–6.
Rethlefsen, M. L., Kirtley, S., Waffenschmidt, S., Ayala, A. P., Moher, D., Page, M. J., & Koffel, J. B. (2021). PRISMA-S: an extension to the PRISMA Statement for Reporting Literature Searches in Systematic Reviews. 10(1), 39. https://doi.org/10.1186/s13643-020-01542-z