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Duration
One week
Language
English Slides with Arabic Speaking
Open
2024
Overview
Overview
Systematic Literature Review Workshop
Objectives:
- Know the types of the study design.
- Identify the difference between the narrative review. In addition to the systematic review.
- Describe all fundamental concepts of the meta-analysis.
- Know the development of PRISMA.
- Learn how to appraise any systematic review.
- Take the example of the appraisal of the systematic review of probiotics to prevent infection.
Literature Review
- Firstly, A literature review is an evaluative report of information found in the literature related to your selected study area.
- Secondly, It should give a theoretical base for research and help you (the author) determine the research nature.
Why Systematic Reviews?
- Firstly, Unmanageable Information
- Secondly, Single studies rarely give the definitive answer
- Thirdly, The explicit methodology of SRs
↓ Bias ↑ Reliability & accuracy
- Then, Meta-analysis increase precision
- Finally, Identify research gaps
Systematic Reviews
- It is a literature review collects and critically analyses multiple research studies or papers.
- Then, finding and analysing studies that relate to and answer those questions in a structured methodology.
- They are designed to provide a complete summary of current literature relevant to a research question.
Steps in the Systematic Review Process
1. Identify your research question
- Formulate a clear, well-defined research question of appropriate scope. Define your terminology.
- Find existing reviews on your topic to inform the development of your research question, identify gaps, and confirm that you are not duplicating the efforts of previous studies.
- Consider using a framework like PICO (see below) to define your question scope.
2. Define inclusion and exclusion criteria
- Clearly, state the criteria you will use to determine whether or not a study will be included in your search.
- Consider study populations, design, intervention types, comparison groups, and measured outcomes.
3. Search for studies
- Run your searches in the databases you’ve identified as relevant to your topic.
- Work with a librarian to help you design comprehensive search strategies across various databases.
- Approach the grey literature methodically and purposefully.
- Collect all the retrieved records from each search into a reference manager, such as Endnote, and de-duplicate the library before the screening.
4. Select studies for inclusion based on pre-defined criteria
- Start with a title/abstract screening to remove studies unrelated to your topic.
- Use your inclusion/exclusion criteria to screen the full text of studies.
- Two independent reviewers are highly recommended to screen all studies, resolving areas of disagreement by consensus.
5. Extract data from included studies
- Use a spreadsheet, or systematic review software, to extract all relevant data from each included study.
- You must pilot your data extraction tool to determine if other fields should be included or existing fields clarified.
6. Evaluate the risk of bias in included studies
- Use a Risk of Bias tool (such as the Cochrane RoB Tool) to assess the potential biases of studies regarding study design and other factors.
- You can adapt existing tools to best meet the needs of your review, depending on the types of studies included.
7. Present results and assess the quality of evidence
- present your findings, including detailed methodology (such as search strategies used, selection criteria, etc.)
- Such that your review can be easily updated in the future with new research findings.
- Perform a meta-analysis if the studies allow. Provide recommendations for practice and policy-making if sufficient, high-quality evidence exists or future research directions to fill gaps in knowledge or strengthen the evidence.
Goals of the Systematic Review
- The goal of SR is to provide a single best estimate of the treatment effect
- Pooling results from multiple studies random error
Definitions of the Forest Plot
- Weight: (The size of the box), the weight by which each study influences the pooled effect estimate
- Confidence interval whiskers: The thin horizontal lines indicate the magnitude of the confidence interval.
- UCI: Upper limit of CI
- LCI: Lower limit of CI
- ES: Effect estimate = Effect size
- Pooled ES: Diamond shape indicates pooled effect estimate
- I-square, P value: Results of heterogeneity tests used to quantify the number of variations in pooled effect estimates.
Real Example of SR
- This blobbogram shows clinical trials of the use of corticosteroids to hasten lung development in pregnancies where a baby is likely to be born prematurely.
- After a systematic review made the evidence better-known, the treatment was used more, preventing thousands of pre-term babies from dying of infant respiratory distress syndrome.
- This blobbogram is shown, stylised, in part of the Cochrane logo.
The Aim of Systematic Review
- To reduce the load on busy clinicians
- To increase the power of research
- To increase the precision of estimates
- To explain inconsistencies and conflicts
- To identify gaps in research
- It is essential to know the stories of some pharmacist heroes in the field of pharmacy, to take from them some ideas to help you to use your career pathway; know more about these pharmacist heroes from FADIC Pharmacy Podcast through this Link.
Curriculum
-
Systematic Literature Review
- Steps in the Systematic Review Process
- What is Systematic Review & Meta-analysis?
- Final Project
-
Your Certificate
- And Finally, Your Certificate…
Features
40 USD
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