Adoption of automation tools to undertake scoping reviews

Oral
2024 Prague [Global Evidence Summit]
Alexander L1, Ameen D2, Asran A3, Evans C4, Godfrey C5, Khalil H6, McInerney P7, Moraes E8, Munn Z9, Peters M10, Pieper D8, Pollock D11, Taneri P12, Tricco A
1The Scottish Centre for Evidence-based, Multi-professional Practice: A JBI Centre of Excellence, Aberdeen, UK
2Monash University, Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health sciences. School of Medicine , VIC, Australia
3The Nottingham Centre for Evidence Based Healthcare: A JBI Centre of Excellence, University of Nottingham, UK
4Queen’s Collaboration for Health Care Quality: A JBI Centre of Excellence, Queen’s University School of Nursing , Kingston, Ontario, Canada
5La Trobe University, Department of Public Health , Melbourne , Victoria, Australia
6The Wits JBI Centre for Evidence-Based Practice: A JBI Centre of Excellence, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa
7Federal Fluminense University, Nursing School, Department of Nursing Fundamentals and Administration , Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
8Health Evidence Synthesis, Recommendations and Impact (HESRI), School of Public Health, University of Adelaide, Adelaide , SA, Australia
9University of South Australia, Clinical and Health Sciences, Rosemary Bryant AO Research Centre, Adelaide, SA , Australia
10Faculty of Health Sciences Brandenburg, Brandenburg Medical School (Theodor Fontane), Institute for Health Services and Health System Research, Rüdersdorf, Germany
11HRB-Trials Methodology Research Network. College of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences, University of Galway, Galway, Ireland
12Epidemiology Division and Institute for Health, Management, and Evaluation, Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada

Background:

The adoption of automation tools for systematic reviews has been relatively slow. There are several reasons for this, including the fact that very few tools have data on their validity and reliability available, licensing issues or costs, the steep learning curve in using the tools, lack of support for some freely available tools, and lack of integration of some tools used into one streamlined platform.

Objectives:

This presentation will discuss a variety of validated automation tools to be used for each step of the scoping review process.

Methods:

The guidance presented in this work is adapted from the results of a scoping review and consultations with the JBI Scoping Review Methodology group.

Results:

This presentation describes several reliable, validated automation tools and software that can be used to enhance the conduct of scoping reviews. Developments in the automation of systematic reviews, and more recently scoping reviews, are continuously evolving. We detail several helpful tools in order of the key steps recommended by the JBI’s methodological guidance for undertaking scoping reviews, including team establishment, protocol development, searching, deduplication, screening titles and abstracts, data extraction, data charting, and report writing.

Conclusion:

There are useful automation tools and software programs to use in undertaking each step of a scoping review. This guidance has the potential to inform collaborative efforts aiming at the development of evidence-informed, integrated automation tools and software packages for enhancing the conduct of high-quality scoping reviews.