Systematic Reviews in Evidence

Based Medicine

Presenter 1: Dr. Subhasree Nag

[Link]@[Link]

Presenter 2: Mr. Sanjay Rajan

[Link]@[Link]

29th March 2023

 Our panelist for today

Dr. Subhasree Nag

Dr. Subhasree Nag is a Senior Regional Solutions Consultant (APAC) for the life sciences
and scholarly research division at Clarivate. She completed her PhD from Texas Tech
University Health Sciences Center, USA and her post-doctoral training from Pacific
Northwest National Laboratory, USA.

A pharmacologist and toxicologist by training, she has more than 8 years of research
experience in anticancer drug discovery and pharmacokinetics areas with 26 peer
reviewed publications and more than 1500 citations.
At Clarivate, she is involved in promoting Clarivate's drug discovery and scholarly
research solutions, conducting author and research capacity workshops, bespoke
consulting projects, etc.
She was a co-author on the UGC-Good Academic Research Practices guidance
document released in 2020.

2
 Our panelist for today

Mr. Sanjay Rajan

Sanjay Rajan is a Senior Customer Education Trainer at Clarivate. He has over 14 years
experience in Information service Industry​. He is an alumni of CSIR-NISCAIR and has
worked in various life sciences domains with several conference presentations. He is
engaged in supporting and helping academic organizations, research scholars, faculties
and students across South Asia in empowering their research & learning process.​ Sanjay
is a PQDT Global product champion and provides support across APAC, EMEA and USA

3
Agenda
•What is a systematic review?
•Important Steps involved in SR for Medical research: Creating the
SR Protocol, PRISMA flow diagram, Assess risk of Bias, Synthesis,
and Interpretation
•Forming a question using the PICO(T) framework and Developing
the most effective search strategy
•Identify right platforms to search the most impactful documents
– the Web of Science and Health Research Premium Collection
Platform
•Exporting results to a Reference Management System
•Where to publish?
 Narrative Reviews
• Usually written by experts in the field
• Use informal and subjective methods to
collect and interpret information
• Usually narrative summaries of the evidence

Systematic Reviews
review evidence on a clearly formulated question
that uses
methods to
• Identify
Each included study may be assigned an objective assessment • Select
of methodological quality preferably by using methods • critically appraise relevant primary research
conforming to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic • extract and analyse data from the studies that are
Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) statement or the high- included in the review
quality standards of the Cochrane Collaboration
Read:
⚫ Klassen et al. Guides for Reading and Interpreting Systematic Reviews. Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med 1998;152:700-704.
⚫ Undertaking Systematic Reviews of Research on Effectiveness. CRD’s Guidance for those Carrying Out or Commissioning Reviews.
CRD Report Number 4 (2nd Edition). NHS Centre for Reviews and Dissemination, University of York. March 2001
⚫ Higgins JPT, Green S (editors). Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions Version 5.1.0 [updated March 2011]. The
Cochrane Collaboration, 2011. Available from [Link]., Section 1.2.2
Systematic vs. Narrative Review
Systematic Review Narrative Review
High-level overview of primary research on a focused question Qualitatively summarizes evidence on a topic using informal or
Definition that identifies, selects, synthesizes, and appraises all high quality subjective methods to collect and interpret studies
research evidence relevant to that question
Answers a focused clinical question Provide summary or overview of topic
Goals Eliminate bias Subject to author bias
Clearly defined and answerable clinical question Can be a general topic or a specific question
Question Recommend using PICO as a guide
Pre-specified eligibility criteria Introduction
Systematic search strategy Methods
Components Assessment of the validity of findings Discussion
Interpretation and presentation of results Conclusion
Reference list Reference list
Number of Authors Three or more One or more
Timeline Months to years, Average eighteen months Weeks to months
Thorough knowledge of topic Understanding of topic
Requirement Perform searches of all relevant databases Perform searches of one or more databases
Statistical analysis resources (for meta-analysis)
Connects practicing clinicians to high quality evidence Provides summary of literature on the topic
Value Supports evidence-based practice Cant replicate
Meta-analysis may be used to combine data

Source: [Link] 5
Key elements of a Systematic Review
Structured, systematic process involving several steps
Systematic Reviews use clearly-defined protocols and
• Formulate the question procedures that ensure accountability and transparency,
• Plan the review including:
• Comprehensive search
• Unbiased selection and abstraction process
• Critical appraisal of data A research question that addresses Population,
• Synthesis of data (may include meta-analysis)
• Interpretation of results
Intervention, Control, Outcome and Setting (PICOS)
• Reporting the review
• All steps described explicitly in the review methods (or similar)
([Link]
earn/[Link])
Limitations:
• Results may still be inconclusive Compliance with the PRISMA statement
• There may be no trials/evidence ([Link]
• The trials may be of poor quality
• The intervention may be too complex to be tested by a trial
• Practice does not change just because you have the evidence of
effect/effectiveness
Systematic Review Workflow
Scope of this Webinar Use Web of Science and In other
ProQuest for this part words….
This webinar will offer detailed
suggestions for only some stages of the
entire Systematic Review on Biomedical
topics:
• Evaluation of Online Literature
Sources
• Which databases and main
research types
• Translating the Review Question
into a search query
• Building the Search strategy –
Best practices
• Running the most efficient search
• Post Processing tools: Document
the strategy
• Save the results

The entire process as represented by

Rahul G. Patwari, Rush University Medical Center
[Link]
Recommended Literature Sources

• Web of Science Core Collection

• MedLine on Web of Science
• Proquest Health Research Premium Collection

Why these databases? They are structured and help answer the question in the PICO format
Steps in a Systematic Review

11
How do we define the search?

EX.: Can antibiotics help alleviate the symptoms of a sore throat better
than anti-inflammatories?

Follow the Cochrane Acronyms: PICO or PICO (T)

Population/Problem - sore throat
Intervention - antibiotics or anti-infectives or antimicrobials
Comparison - e.g. anti-inflammatories, NSAIDs, placebo
Outcomes - alleviation, therapeutic effect
Type of Study- e.g. randomized studies only
T can also stand for time- the duration for your data collection
• [Link]
• [Link]
• Guyatt G, Drummond R, Meade M, Cook D. The Evidence Based-Medicine Working Group Users’ Guides to the Medical Literature. 2nd edition.
McGraw Hill; Chicago: 2008.
Every Systematic Review need not follow the PICO(T) approach
Tufanaru C, Munn Z, Stephenson M, Aromataris E. Fixed or random effects meta-
analysis? Common methodological issues in systematic reviews of effectiveness. Int J
Examples: Evid Based Healthc. 2015;13(3):196–207. [PubMed]

Lockwood C, Munn Z, Porritt K. Qualitative research synthesis: methodological

• Experiential (Qualitative) reviews guidance for systematic reviewers utilizing meta-aggregation. Int J Evid Based
Healthc. 2015;13(3):179–187. [PubMed]

• Costs/Economic Evaluation reviews Gomersall JS, Jadotte YT, Xue Y, Lockwood S, Riddle D, Preda A. Conducting systematic
reviews of economic evaluations. Int J Evid Based Healthc. 2015;13(3):170–
178. [PubMed]
• Prevalence and/or Incidence reviews Munn Z, Moola S, Lisy K, Riitano D, Tufanaru C. Methodological guidance for
systematic reviews of observational epidemiological studies reporting prevalence and
• Diagnostic Test Accuracy reviews cumulative incidence data. Int J Evid Based Healthc. 2015;13(3):147–153. [PubMed]

Campbell JM, Klugar M, Ding S, et al. Diagnostic test accuracy: methods for systematic
• Etiology and/or Risk reviews review and meta-analysis. Int J Evid Based Healthc. 2015;13(3):154–162. [PubMed]

Moola S, Munn Z, Sears K, et al. Conducting systematic reviews of association

• Expert opinion/policy reviews (etiology): the Joanna Briggs Institute's approach. Int J Evid Based
Healthc. 2015;13(3):163–169. [PubMed]

• Psychometric reviews McArthur A, Klugarova J, Yan H, Florescu S. Innovations in the systematic review of
text and opinion. Int J Evid Based Healthc. 2015;13(3):188–195. [PubMed]

• Prognostic reviews Mokkink LB, Terwee CB, Patrick DL, et al. The COSMIN checklist for assessing the
methodological quality of studies on measurement properties of health status
measurement instruments: an international Delphi study. Qual Life
• Methodological systematic reviews Res. 2010;19(4):539–549. [PubMed]

Dretzke J, Ensor J, Bayliss S, et al. Methodological issues and recommendations for

[Link] systematic reviews of prognostic studies: an example from cardiovascular
disease. Systematic reviews. 2014;3(1):1 [PubMed]
Steps in the Review Process

Writing the Protocol:

• Ensures transparency
• Ensures accountability
• Avoid duplication- PROSPERO

• The Background section of the protocol should put your review in the context of what you already know, and the
questions you want to answer.
• The Objective section should be derived from the research question and should relate to the PICO elements
• The Methodology should be planned using the Cochrane Handbook, and its guidance based on the latest
methodological research-Keep broad inclusion criteria, and be cognizant of rationale for exclusion
• Decide which studies will be selected for the review (inclusion criteria)and how will they be assessed (including
software use)
 Qualities of a good search
✓ Clear research question
✓ Comprehensive search
✓All domains, no language restriction, unpublished and published literature, up-to-date
✓ Document the search (replicability)

Quality of evidence generated by a review depends entirely on the primary studies which
make up the review.

Read:
[Link]
 Components of Electronic Searching
• Describe each PICO component
• Start with primary concept
• Find synonyms
• Identify MeSH / descriptors / subject headings
• Add text words
• Add other components of PICO question to narrow citations (may use study
filter)
• Examine abstracts
• Harness the power of citations
• Use search strategy in other databases (may need adapting)

• Keep accurate records and track

• Give a summary of the total number of records identified in your search
• identify the number excluded at each stage of the screening process
• provide reasons for any articles excluded when assessed in full text
• Present a PRISMA flow diagram.
• Keeping records complete
PRISMA In SYSTEMATIC REVIEWS
Preferred Reporting Items for
Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses
(PRISMA) statement, published in 2009
and updated in 2020, is designed to
help systematic reviewers transparently
report :
• why the review was done
• what the authors did
• and what they found

Checklist of 27 items (See-

[Link]
that facilitate better reporting in SR

Read:
[Link]

[Link]
Sample Review Methodology
Sample Review Methodology
Evidence Based Research Types - Definitions
• Case report – a description of a particular service or event, often focusing on unusual
aspects of the reported situation or adverse occurrences.
• Case series – a description of more than one case.
• Case-control study – An observational study in which the cases have the issue of interest but
the controls do not.
• Cohort study – An observational study of a particular group over a period of time.
• Randomized Controlled Trial – An experimental study in which users are randomly allocated
to one of two or more options, where some get the option of interest and others get
another option (e.g. a standard service).
• Systematic review – An approach that involves capturing and assessing the evidence by
some systematic method, where all the components of the approach and the assessment
are made explicit and documented. Some systematic reviews include a meta-analysis (see
below).
• Meta-analysis - A method of synthesizing the data from more than one study, in order to
produce a statistic summary.
Type of Question and Study Design

Can be searched as
Document Types in
various databases

Figure taken from (Level of Evidence (2011), Oxford Centre for Evidence-based Medicine, CEBM).
Read: [Link]
 Analysis and Interpretation
Critical Appraisal

Critical appraisal is the process of systematically looking at research papers to assess three
important things: trustworthiness, value and relevance.

When critically appraising a research paper the first step is to examine the study for any bias.
.
A study which is sufficiently free from bias is said to have internal validity. A study will be said to
have external validity when it can be generalized to the clinical (or wider population) context.

Critical appraisal checklists (see here, here, here, and here) provide a framework for interpreting
and determining the reliability of the evidence. Checklists are designed to help you answer the
questions - is the study unbiased, are the findings reliable, and are the findings valid?

22
 Analysis and Interpretation
Synthesis and Interpretation

Tables and figures help to present included studies and their

findings in a systematic and clear format.

Forest plots are the standard way to illustrate results of individual

studies and meta-analyses. These can be generated using
Cochrane’s Review Manager software.

A ‘Summary of findings’ table provides key information concerning

the quality of evidence, the magnitude of effect of the
interventions examined, and the sum of available data on all
important outcomes for a given comparison.

The abstract of a review should be focused primarily at decision

makers (including clinicians, informed consumers and policy
makers); and a ‘Plain language summary' conveys the findings in a
style that can be understood by the general public.

It is important to measure and address heterogeneity in systematic reviews

as it affects the extent to which conclusions can be relied on. 23
Building the Search

24
 Building the search from a PICO question

Can antibiotics help alleviate the symptoms of a sore throat better than anti-inflammatories?

Patient(s) Intervention(s) Comparison(s) Outcome(s)

Sore throat Antibiotics anti-inflammatory alleviat*
Pharyngitis Antibacterial Agents anti-inflammatory agents healing
Antimicrobial relief
 [Link](“Pharyngitis”)
P [Link](“anti-bacterial agents”) or [Link]("Antibiotics" or
I "Antimicrobial agents") or SU(anti-bacterial-agents or Antibiotics or Antimicrobial-
agents)
[Link](“anti-inflammatory agents”) or
C
Designing the Search Strategy
[Link]("Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs" or "Analgesics") or
SU(anti-inflammatory-agents or Nonsteroidal-anti-inflammatory-drug or NSAID or
P Analgesics)
(Throat or pharyn[*15]) n/2 (ache or pain or sore or inflammation) or Pharyngitis or
pharyngalgia
I (Anti-Bacterial or Anti-Mycobacterial or Antibacterial or Antimycobacterial or Bactericid*
or Bacteriocidal or Bacteriocide* or Anti-infective or Anti-microbial or Antiinfective or
C Antimicrobial) n/2 (Compound* or agent* or drug*) or Antibiotic*
anti-inflammatories or antiinflammatories or (antiinflammatory or anti-inflammatory or
O antiphlogistic) n/2 (agent* or drug*) or NSAID
Alleviat* or relief or relieves or healed or heals or heal or healing
Web of Science™ and ProQuest™ in SR

27
Web of Science Platform
Multidisciplinary research experience and content types all linked together - across the sciences,
social sciences, and arts and humanities

34,000+ 87 Million
Journals across the Patents for over 43
platform million inventions

21,400+ 8.9 Million+

Total journals in the Data Sets and Data
Core Collection Studies

254 Backfiles to 1900

Subject categories With cover-to-cover indexing

176 Million+ 225,000+

Records Conference proceedings

23+ Million 111,000+

Full Text Records Books

2 Billion +
Statistics as of November 2022 28
citations
Research with confidence
Web of Science Core Collection

Multidisciplinary and international

in scope
Track the development Conduct data-intensive
studies Over 21,000 journals across the
and evolution of ideas Science Citation Index Expanded
Find early discoveries in conference More researchers rely on the Web of
literature and explore their progression Science Core Collection than on Scopus Social Sciences Citation Index
in journal literature and books. and Google Scholar for systematic review Arts & Humanities Citation Index
and research evaluation.*
Emerging Sources Citation Index

Over 225,000 conferences in the

Uncover related research Trust your resources in an Conference Proceedings Citation
via citation linking age of misinformation Index
Leverage a powerful citation network to Consistent, rigorous evaluation and Over 128,000 books in the Book
find papers that have cited works of art,
fiction, data models, government reports,
curation means you can have confidence
in the quality of your results.
Citation Index
and other material.

*Read ISI's Value of Bibliometric Databases Report Statistics as of October 2021 © Clarivate 2021 29
Protect your research reputation
Editorial integrity and publisher neutrality

Confidently navigate the

growing complexities
of journal publishing.
Publisher neutral In-house curation Vetted OA content Make high stakes
Our in-house experts, who
have no affiliations to
Rigorous curation processes
guard against inclusion of
Access over 18 million open decisions about
access papers—including
publishers or research hijacked journals, and expert green OA– from reputable resource allocation
institutes, select the review ensures that journals journals that have been
journals in the Core are correctly classified into vetted against our 28 and people with data
Collection to provide you the appropriate subject evaluation criteria for quality
with a data set of the categories so that your and impact. Easily that is independent of
world’s leading research statistical reporting and determine which fields are
publications that is free of analyses are accurate. well covered by this bias.
potential industry bias or Databases that rely on material so that you can
conflict of interest. algorithmic approaches* or reserve your budget for only
occasional outside review the most critical gaps.
lack consistency and
oversight.

*[Link]
keep-fooling-one-of-the-worlds-leading-databases/ More information Statistics as of October 2021 © Clarivate 2021 30
Preprint Citation Index

• Quickly locate the latest

breakthroughs on your topic
and automatically monitor
new developments.
• Assess preprint quality with
the help of enhanced author
information and an
understanding of its place in
the scholarly ecosystem.
• Trace the evolution of an
idea from early findings
through to published
research.

31
Connect preprints to the scholarly ecosystem
Assess preprint quality with more data and stay up to date

Version of record Researcher profiles Alerts

Find and reference peer- Expand your view of a Get notified when new
reviewed articles with researcher’s expertise preprints relevant to
links from preprints to and place preprints in your work are added to
Web of Science Core the context of a the platform or a
Collection records. researcher’s career. researcher profile.

Citations Standardized metadata

Uncover the connections Identify trends in the
between unpublished, preprint landscape with
cutting-edge research complete, standardized
and papers published in preprint metadata.
scholarly journals.

32
Assess and monitor research with powerful analytics
Meticulous metadata construction

Cited references for all All author names and Funding data from
papers back to 1900 addresses captured for 2008-present enables
help you discover the all papers ensures that you to understand the
origins of today’s your high stakes funding landscape and
scholarly research. decisions are the right connect outputs to
ones. grants.

Standardized author Cover-to-cover indexing Daily updates equip you

affiliations save you provides you with the with information on the
time compiling certainty that your latest breakthroughs.
productivity statistics. discovery and analysis is
free of any hidden gaps.

Statistics as of October 2021 © Clarivate 2021 33

Quality, Varied Source of Information to Meet SR Needs

34
For Effective Systematic Literature Review

Effective
Systematic
Literature Review

35
Leveraging the Unique and Unpublished Findings
Industry relies on academia for Academia relies on industry for
basic research and evaluating clinical trials funding, equipment, and infrastructure
Successful collaborations
• Statins and reduction in deaths from cardiovascular disease in 1980s
• Anti-HIV medicine and reduction in deaths from AIDS in 1990s

36
Health Research Premium Collection

37
Health Research Premium | Single point of Access Across all Health and Medical
Specialties

Premier full-text journals Gray literature Evidence-based resources

• Current, peer-reviewed journals • Theses & Dissertations • Evidence-based summaries
• Exclusive access to NEJM, BMJ, • Pre-prints • Systematic reviews
and The Lancet • NGO reports • Cohort and experimental studies
• Shortest embargoes
• Conference papers • Expert opinions
• Access via PubMed
• Other varied sources

More than just the best journals…

38
What Do You Get in ProQuest HRPC

631
209
Magazines Trade
Journals

7,051 5,653
Publications Scholarly
Journals

132,817 254
Dissertation Ebook
& Thesis Chapters &
Reports &
Others

39
World-class Biomedical and Health Journals

40
Highest Quality Publishing Partners

41
Using Web of Science for SR

42
Find published Systematic Reviews

Depending on the database, the terms can be indexed as Document Types or Subjects.

Health Research Premium Collection

The terms Systematic Review,

Meta-analysis are often found in
the Document Title, or can be
indexed in the Subject field(s).
The SU Subject field includes also
the terms from the Thesaurus.
Syntax: ti,su (systematic review)]
 Find published Systematic Reviews
Limiting the search by Document Type or other fields when searching Medline on Web of Science

Medline
Useful Document Types:
• Comparative Study
• Meta-analysis
• Multicenter Study
• Randomized Control Trial
• Systematic Review
• Validation Studies

[Link]
Find Published Systematic Reviews- Web of Science Platform

Medline

AND, OR, NOT, NEAR,

SAME, *?$, Lemmatization
Search Rules →
Search Operators →
Sort Options →
Wildcards →
Search Web of Science to track ideas across disciplines and time from over 1.7
billion cited references from over 171 million records.
With Web of Science Core Collection, search the top journals, conference
proceedings and books, in the sciences, social sciences, and arts and humanities
to find the high quality research most relevant to your area of interest.
[Link]
Medline Thesaurus

Using the Medline Subject Headings Thesaurus

If a preferred term shows

narrower terms in the
hierarchy, the explosion will
retrieve them all with one
single command

Synonyms of pharyngitis
might help with the Free text
search
Retrieving Systematic Reviews available in literature
• Run the topic search, then limit to the Systematic Review or Meta-analysis documents.
• Not all the databases have these definitions in the Doc Type, however most often they
are included in the title of the document.
Database Selection: WoS Platform

384 records
Harnessing the power of citations
Retrieving Systematic Reviews available in literature
• Run the topic search, then limit to the Systematic Review or Meta-analysis documents.
• Not all the databases have these definitions in the Doc Type, however most often they
are included in the title of the document.
Database Selection: WoS Platform
((Throat or pharyn*) <near/2> (ache or pain or sore or inflammation)) or Pharyngitis or pharyngalgia
(Topic) AND (Anti-Bacterial or Anti-Mycobacterial or Antibacterial or Antimycobacterial or Bactericid* or
Bacteriocidal or Bacteriocide* or Anti-infective or Anti-microbial or Antiinfective or Antimicrobial)
<near/2>(Compound* or agent* or drug*) or Antibiotic* (Topic)
Literature Search
Navigating the Citation Network to follow a research thread and find possible relevant outliers
• Cites References – the research that a paper cites
• Times Cited – more recently published papers that cite the paper
• Related Records – papers which share at least one cited reference in common with the paper.
If they share citations, they’re likely discussing similar topics.

This is perfect for finding publications

that are related to each other, via the
citations that were made.
It is particularly useful:-
• where keywords in the topic are not
easy to define
• where older research needs to be
traced
• when you need to see where a
particular research thread leads.
50
Literature Search
Narrow the results of your search by using any of
the Refine Results options :
• Web of Science Categories (254 fields of research)
• Document Types (journal, review, book, etc.)
• Publication Years
• Organization-Enhanced (Unified organisations)
• Source Titles (journal, conference name, etc.)
• Funding Agencies
• Open Access (including type of Open Access)
• And more!

You can also Sort your results: by newest; most cited;

usage counts; recently added; relevance; etc.
51
Data Evaluation
Highly Cited / Hot Papers Usage Counts

Highly Cited and Hot Paper indicators put citation counts into Citation take time to accrue, so they are not a good indicator
context. They take into account the field of research, year of of influence for recent publications. For this reason we provide
publication and document type, comparing ‘like with like’. This Usage Counts. Every time a Web of Science user clicks a full
information comes from our Essential Science Indicators. text link or exports a record, the record’s Usage Count is
incremented. So it provides an indication of interest.
52
Data Evaluation
Viewing the Full Text to understand content Open Access Status

To fully understand any publication you need to read it. Web of Some reviews include an evaluation of Open Access, others
Science has several in built routes to access Full Text. In have a requirement to either include or exclude Open Access
addition you could add EndNote Click to your browser to publications. Web of Science has Open Access version as a
leverage subscription services as well as Open Access sources. filter, so these types of evaluation can be carried out.

53
Managing your Results
The Marked List page stores records selected from
your search results. After marking records, you can
save your Marked List and return to it later.
Save up to 50 Marked Lists with up to 50,000 records per
list. In order to save, you must be logged into your Web of
Science personal profile.

Use the Marked List to:

• Store your search results - it's not always possible to
finish your search in one session. Marking records for
your next visit to Web of Science helps you pick up
where you left off.
• Group articles together you want to analyze - gather
the perfect set of publications, then use Analyze to
understand trends across them, or use Citation Report
to reveal the articles that cite your selections.
• Create a custom set of items to export. There are lots
of export options - send to EndNote for later use in
writing a paper, print, email or even export to
InCites Benchmarking & Analytics for detailed citation
analysis.

54
Managing your Results
Saving (and revisiting) your Searches
Saving a search is a way to return to that search
as many times as needed to complete your
work.
Web of Science stores the search statement you
use in your personal profile, so that you can
always return to it and edit, or rerun it against
different time periods or parameters.
You can create complex queries by combining
many searches together in your Search History,
then save the combinations (Export search
session) so they don't have to be recreated
each time you come into Web of Science.
They mean your results are repeatable.
You can also send your search methods to
other Web of Science users.

55
Managing your Results
Creating Alerts (to keep up to date)
Your Web of Science account also allows you to use your Saved Searches as
Alerts that notify you of updates in the data.
Search Alerts - save a search and establish a daily, weekly or monthly email
notification when new publications are added that match.
In addition, there are two other types of Alert:-
Citation Alerts - have a favourite or important article you want to
track? We'll notify you when it receives new citations.
Table of Contents Alerts (Journal Alerts) - subscribers to our Current
Contents Connect database can set up TOC alerts for their favorite journals
all in one place.

Recent updates to Alerting in Web of Science

• All Database Alerting: Set one alert across all collections in your Web of Science subscription.
• One Click Access: Go directly to the Web of Science platform for ALL the records returned in your alert.
• Alerts are delivered directly to your email (or multiple email addresses, suitable for viewing on your mobile device.

56
Managing your Results
Outputting your Results
The relevant results can be exported to other
applications, for further analysis or to cite in
your review.
Common options are to export to Excel for
analysis and to EndNote (or another Reference
Management application) for citing.
You can stipulate how much metadata is
exported by selecting an option from the list.

57
Writing the literature review
FIND AND SELECT CITATIONS and EDIT CITATIONS to add information such as a page REFORMAT YOUR ENTIRE PAPER
insert them into your manuscript. number, or remove a reference from a group of citations. and bibliography with one click.

Using EndNote’s Cite

While You Write, you
can instantly insert and
format citations and
bibliographies when
writing your review.

Over 7,000 styles are

available, plus you can
create your own.

Collaborate with others

by sharing your library.

58
Publishing your Literature Review
Compare your options and start the
submission process

Master Journal List returns a list of

possible journal Matches, based on your
title, abstract and list of references.

It provides the following information for

the resulting journals:-
• Match Score
• JCR Impact Factor
• Journal
• JCR Category
• Rank in Category
• Quartile in Category
• Link to journal’s website
• Publisher links

59
Publishing your Literature Review
Use Journal Citation Reports to
compare journals you might publish in

Journal Citation Reports (JCR) provides

detailed metrics on journals in the Web of
Science.

Use these metrics to make an informed

decision on which journal to try to get
published in.

One example is the % Articles in Citable

Items. If this is 0% the journal is focused on
reviews, if it is 100% they do not publish
reviews.

60
Publishing your Literature Review
The Master Journal List provides
plenty of useful information too

The Master Journal List provides detailed

information on journals in the Web of
Science.

Useful information includes Open Access

status, including APC fees.

There is also valuable information on a

journal’s review process, like whether they
operate ‘blind’ or ‘double blind’ reviews.

It also provides the average time from

submission to publication.

61
ProQuest Platform: The power of HRPC

62
Recommended Search techniques on Proquest

Some details of the search This field is generated by the

search in the Visual Thesaurus
[Link](“Antibiotics")
TISU,DTYPE(systematic review or meta-analysis or These fields (Title, Subjects
metaanalysis) Document Type) can be stuck
to limit the search to only the
(antiinflammatory or anti-inflammatory or content relevant fields. The
antiphlogistic) n/2 (agent* or drug*) comma works as an OR.

S14 AND YR(2010-2019) The proximity operators can

be used to search terms near
When applying the Publication Date narrow one to the other or to link
filter to the results, the YR field is used several alternative terms, to
Search Syntax detailed description in the Search Tips section of the allow all possible
LibGuide [Link] combinations
Recommended Search techniques cont.
Some details of the search The SUbject field works across
SU(anti-bacterial-agents or Antibiotics or databases on several levels of
descriptors, including Thesaurus
Antimicrobial-agents)
Controlled terms, if any.
(Throat or pharyn[*15]) n/2 (ache or pain or Different databases have different
sore or inflammation) or Pharyngitis or sets of controlled terms, so avoid
pharyngalgia using the EXACT prefix when using
(S4 or S8) AND PD(20150101-20190218) SU across databases.
An efficient free text search
should use as many synonyms as
For date restrictions including month and day use the
known, for higher recall. Get also
field PD. A range of dates is searched with the hyphen -
help by the Thesaurus synonyms!
If the search strategy includes several steps, you can
quickly run it using the Command Line Search form.
Enter up to 5 search steps in one go and hit Search.
The system will create separate steps, which you can
easily review in Recent Searches
• In Recent Searches all the separate steps you entered in Command
Line are displayed separately with their distinct result numbers.
• They are numbered sequentially and you can combine them using
the set numbers in the box above to go farther into the search.
Complete Search sample
Set# Searched for Results
S1 [Link](“Pharyngitis”) 16229*
S2 [Link](“anti-bacterial agents”) or [Link]("Antibiotics" OR "Antimicrobial 894199*
agents") OR SU(“anti-bacterial agents” or "Antibiotics" OR "Antimicrobial agents")
S3 [Link](“anti-inflammatory agents”) OR [Link]("Nonsteroidal anti- 660124*
inflammatory drugs" OR "Analgesics") OR SU(“anti-inflammatory agents” OR "Nonsteroidal anti-
inflammatory drugs" OR NSAID OR "Analgesics")
S4 (Throat or pharyn[*15]) n/2 (ache or pain or sore or inflammation) or Pharyngitis or pharyngalgia 72021*
S5 (Anti-Bacterial or Anti-Mycobacterial or Antibacterial or Antimycobacterial or Bactericid* or Bacteriocidal 1434825*
or Bacteriocide* or Anti-infective or Anti-microbial or Antiinfective or Antimicrobial) n/2 (Compound* or
agent* or drug*) or Antibiotic*
S6 anti-inflammatories or antiinflammatories or (antiinflammatory or anti-inflammatory or antiphlogistic) 370967*
n/2 (agent* or drug*) OR NSAID
S7 Alleviat* or relief or relieves or healed or heals or heal or healing 1862668*
S8 S1 OR S4 79469*
S9 S2 OR S5 1765487*
S10 S3 OR S6 856983*
S11 S7 AND S8 AND S9 AND S10 1292°
S12 S11 AND YR(2015-2019) 359°
Using the ProQuest Thesaurus
Using the ProQuest Thesaurus
From HRPC Collection
Multifile search - Duplicates Removal

• The Duplicates removal is setup by default to be active.

• In Advanced Search the option can be deactivated or reactivated
on the spot, in the expanded Result page options section at the
bottom of the page, and by checking/unchecking the related box.
• When active, the number of results shows the final result after the
removal, up to a maximum of 5000. Above 5000 the nr of results
shown is before the removal.
Documentation of the search strategy used: saving the search history

The Recent Searches page can be

reached by clicking on the clock symbol.
This contains the history of all the
searches executed during the current
session. Once completed, the Search
History can be saved in various formats.
Saving the search to re-run it periodically.

Need to rerun the search periodically? In the Results page you can save the search in My Research, either to rerun it
manually (Save Search) or to get automatic notifications of new documents with a given frequency (Create Alert)
Saving the Results

Finally, you can save the results in

1 various ways, to further evaluate them:
2 1 - you can save the documents and
arrange them in folders in My Research
2 - you can export the records in
3 RefWorks or an other Reference
Manager
3 - you can save the results on your pc
in various formats
Search Results Export
Feature to support large-scale literature reviews
Need for “all” search results - Full text not needed
Must be activated for the account by the Library in PAM
User must be authenticated to My Research
List of databases not allowed
Can be found in the Online Help
Feature deactivated if the search includes one of the prohibited databases
Exports all results of a given search in one action
Limited to result sets of 10,000 documents or less
Results exceeding 10K will disable the feature
Search Results Export
Only 2 Search Results Exports per day
Only exports Citation information;
Abstracts optionally included
NO FULL TEXT delivered
output includes links back to the documents

• Results delivered asynchronously:

found in My Research Saved Searches
• Results downloaded as a data file:
spreadsheet compatible or RIS format
Further Reading

80
Build your own Systematic Review search Recommended Best Practices

• Analyze the indexing of different databases (Advanced Search and LibGuides)

• Use the specialized indexing, when available:
• Controlled Vocabulary (Thesaurus) – efficient retrieval
• Free text search – build to be comprehensive, can be less efficient
• Comprehensiveness: build vocabulary of synonyms (help from Thesaurus scope notes)
• Efficiency: focus the search using search fields and special operators
• Design a combination of both levels of searching for a more thorough recall
Further Reading
The fundamental text for the Cochrane protocol is:

Higgins JPT, Thomas J, Chandler J, Cumpston M, Li T, Page MJ, Welch VA (editors). Cochrane Handbook for Systematic
Reviews of Interventions version 6.0 (updated July 2019). Cochrane, 2019. Available from
[Link]/handbook.

which contains an extensive reference bibliography, including:

Booth A. Searching for qualitative research for inclusion in systematic reviews: a structured methodological review.
Systematic Reviews 2016; 5: 74.

Egger M, Smith GD. Bias in location and selection of studies. BMJ 1998; 316: 61-66.

[Link]

PRISMA Elaboration and Explanation Document

Moher D, Shamseer L, Clarke M, Ghersi D, Liberati A, Petticrew M, et al. Preferred reporting items for systematic review
and meta-analysis protocols (PRISMA-P) 2015 statement
Additional Reading Resources

External reference resources on Systematic Reviews and Evidence Based Medicine

[Link]
[Link]

[last viewed: March 2023]

[Link]
[Link]
[Link]
[Link]
Additional Resources

84
ProQuest Health Research Premium Collection

[Link]

85
All Upcoming Events & Webinars
[Link]

86
 [Link]

ProQuest YouTube Channel

87
Thank you

Subhasree Nag, PhD

Sanjay Rajan

[Link]
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Q&A

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