Background:

During a systematic or scoping review, the selection of studies according to the eligibility criteria is a time-consuming process.

Objective:

To spotlight tools within the Rayyan software to streamline reading, minimizing potential errors and misjudgments in the selection process.

Method:

Rayyan is a tool for manage the selection of studies for systematic reviews or scoping reviews. Many of its functionalities are underutilized by users because they are not widely disseminated in academia. The Rayyan’s free version identifies potential duplicates studies, but verification is done manually. The paid version expedites the study selection process by removing duplicates based on similarity percentage determined by artificial intelligence. Another less explored function is “Highlights ON”, which highlights keywords in titles and abstracts to aid in the selection process. When activated, keywords for inclusion are highlighted in green and in red for exclusion. Similarly, ""PICO Highlights ON"" highlights words related to components of the acronym (Population, Intervention, Comparison, Outcome) in abstracts, helping verify inclusion and exclusion criteria. When active, text is highlighted in yellow for PICO Highlights. The ""Computing Rating"" function calibrates with the reviewer, whether studies are more suitable for inclusion or exclusion. It activates after some studies are manually included or excluded. When a study is excluded, a ""Reason"" tag can be assigned to the exclusion reason, manually parameterized. The same applies to inclusion, where a ""Label"" can be added. Labels are not only used for inclusion; they can be used to facilitate the identification of study groups. Studies that receive a specific label can be recognized as a group and examined separately from others. These ""Reason"" and ""Label"" functionalities serve as reminders in consensus meetings in case of disagreements among reviewers.

Results:

With these features active, the two-phase selection process in review studies can occur more efficiently, providing a pace that can improve working times and reduce time wastage.

Conclusion:

Although Rayyan has a lot of functionalities, the users often lack awareness of them and how they can assist in the studies screening process. Presenting these functionalities in a didactic manner can disseminate knowledge to all those interested in evidence synthesis.