Article type
Year
Abstract
Background: The systematic review community has continued to evaluate enabling technologies that may aid in accelerating the delivery and update of reviews while maintaining the required level of scientific rigor. Some tools such as Comprehensive Systematic Reviews (a meta-analysis software package) and Cochrane's RevMan (a meta analysis and report formatting tool) have already been broadly adopted.
A number of review groups have piloted prototypical web-based tools to assist with the screening and data abstraction phases of systematic reviews. These early experiments attempted to determine the feasibility of web-based systems for this task and concluded, in all cases, that web-based screening showed promise but that a more mature web-based system would be required in order to accurately assess any advantages or disadvantages when compared to traditional paper based review processes.
Methods: The Chalmers Research Group introduced its web based systematic review tool, called SRS, in the fall of 2002 and by the spring of 2004 it has hosted 61 systematic reviews conducted by 7 different review groups. Since the inception of the tool, the CRG SRS team has worked closely with different review groups and study coordinators to evaluate the workflow process and to tune and test new web enabled technologies against user needs.
Results: Through above process, the team and the participating reviewers have developed a set of practices and methodologies for screening and data extraction that did not exist or were not feasible prior to the introduction of the web as an enabling technology.
The terms accelerated screening, conflict matching, response reprocessing, par reviewing, article flagging, quarantine, response rate monitoring, and data extraction union all represent practical screening and data extraction methods that have been developed through this project with the web as the enabling technology.
Conclusions: While the new web enabled methods do not represent a fundamental change in the way reviews are conducted, they have introduced significant, measurable efficiencies to the process.
As a side effect, the SRS project has demonstrated overwhelmingly that web base screening and data extraction is not only feasible but, in many cases, preferable to other methods.
Acknowledgements: The authors would like to thank David Moher, Howard Schachter, Ba' Pham, Kathie McDonald and each of participating review teams for their help in developing and refining the methods outlined in this paper.
References: 1. Sampson M, Mensinkai S, Clifford TJ, Husereau DR. Piloting of a web-based method for systematic reviewing; experiences in a review of spinal manipulation for infantile colic. Proceedings of the 11th Annual Cochrane Colloquium. Barcelona, Spain. 2003 2. Haines T. A web-based systematic literature reviewing aid: preliminary assessment of usability. Proceedings of the 11th Annual Cochrane Colloquium. Barcelona, Spain. 2003
A number of review groups have piloted prototypical web-based tools to assist with the screening and data abstraction phases of systematic reviews. These early experiments attempted to determine the feasibility of web-based systems for this task and concluded, in all cases, that web-based screening showed promise but that a more mature web-based system would be required in order to accurately assess any advantages or disadvantages when compared to traditional paper based review processes.
Methods: The Chalmers Research Group introduced its web based systematic review tool, called SRS, in the fall of 2002 and by the spring of 2004 it has hosted 61 systematic reviews conducted by 7 different review groups. Since the inception of the tool, the CRG SRS team has worked closely with different review groups and study coordinators to evaluate the workflow process and to tune and test new web enabled technologies against user needs.
Results: Through above process, the team and the participating reviewers have developed a set of practices and methodologies for screening and data extraction that did not exist or were not feasible prior to the introduction of the web as an enabling technology.
The terms accelerated screening, conflict matching, response reprocessing, par reviewing, article flagging, quarantine, response rate monitoring, and data extraction union all represent practical screening and data extraction methods that have been developed through this project with the web as the enabling technology.
Conclusions: While the new web enabled methods do not represent a fundamental change in the way reviews are conducted, they have introduced significant, measurable efficiencies to the process.
As a side effect, the SRS project has demonstrated overwhelmingly that web base screening and data extraction is not only feasible but, in many cases, preferable to other methods.
Acknowledgements: The authors would like to thank David Moher, Howard Schachter, Ba' Pham, Kathie McDonald and each of participating review teams for their help in developing and refining the methods outlined in this paper.
References: 1. Sampson M, Mensinkai S, Clifford TJ, Husereau DR. Piloting of a web-based method for systematic reviewing; experiences in a review of spinal manipulation for infantile colic. Proceedings of the 11th Annual Cochrane Colloquium. Barcelona, Spain. 2003 2. Haines T. A web-based systematic literature reviewing aid: preliminary assessment of usability. Proceedings of the 11th Annual Cochrane Colloquium. Barcelona, Spain. 2003