Investigating Systematic Reviews Outside Health Sciences Maribeth Slebodnik | slebodnik@email.arizona.edu Kevin Pardon | kevin.pardon@asu.edu Janice Hermer | janice.hermer@asu.edu Background/Objectives Results Limitations Originally developed for medicine and related fields in support of evidencebased practice, systematic reviews (SRs) are now published in other fields. We investigated non-health sciences disciplines that are publishing systematic reviews. Our results show that the non-health science disciplines with the highest number of self described systematic reviews appear to be the social sciences, environmental science, business, computer science and engineering (Figure 1). • The term “systematic review” seems to be inconsistently defined and applied, thus making it difficult to compare across disciplines. • A novel methodology was created and implemented for this project. • A randomized sample of approximately 10% of the total data set was assessed. Subject Categories n=1483 (952 articles) 350 313 300 Discussion/Conclusion 199 200 Our filtered result set included 952 self-described systematic reviews outside the health science disciplines. We then examined a random sample of 90 articles and compared each article’s methodology to health sciences systematic review criteria. 176 150 131 114 100 76 50 38 38 38 35 34 33 29 25 16 9 isci ltid Mu Che mic al E n gin plin eer ary ing try mis Che e Sci als Ma teri ani Hum and Arts enc ties tics sics ma the Ma Eco Phy nom eta lan thP Ear Sci isio n Dec ics ry e enc rgy Ene AgB io g erin ine cie er S Com put Eng nce ss ine Env iron me nta ial l Sc Sci ien enc e ce 0 Soc We searched the Scopus database for articles with “systematic review*” in the title or abstract. Results were limited to review articles. Articles were examined by reviewers to determine if they a) were classified as SRs by the authors, b) written in English and c) addressed a non-health sciences topic. We reconciled differences for articles on which there was not initial consensus, and grouped remaining articles according to Scopus subject areas. 176 Bus Methods 250 Details about inclusion/exclusion criteria and the databases used were often included. A majority of our sample did not clearly describe the search strategy or use published SR protocols as a basis for methodology. Librarians were consulted in only 3 of 90 articles we examined (Figure 2). SR Methodology Analysis n=90 100 • Are inclusion/exclusion criteria specified? • Is a systematic review protocol or equivalent cited as the basis for the research methodology? • Is there a specific search string included? • Are databases or other resources specified? • Was a librarian involved in the process? Next Steps/Questions • How do individual non-health sciences disciplines define systematic reviews, and how do they use SRs? Involve subject matter experts in this phase of research. • Develop a comprehensive list of discipline specific protocols. What do they have in common with health science SR protocols, and how do they differ? • Analyze the entire data set for additional information. 90 SR Methodology Analysis • Less than half of the articles included complete search strings or other search details, making reproducibility difficult. • Some SRs used health sciences protocols while others used a discipline specific SR methodology or novel protocols such as exemplar articles. • The lack of librarians consulted may have contributed to the lack of reproducibility and other quality issues. • Opportunity exists for librarians working in these fields to collaborate with researchers and to provide guidance on systematic reviews. 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 References I/E Criteria Protocol Search string Yes No Databases Librarian JBIKocher, M., & Riegelman, A. (2018). Systematic reviews and evidence synthesis: Resources beyond the health sciences. College & Research Libraries News, 79(5), 248. Rethlefsen, M. L., Farrell, A. M., Osterhaus Trzasko, L. C., & Brigham, T. J. (2015). Librarian co-authors correlated with higher quality reported search strategies in general internal medicine systematic reviews. J Clin Epidemiol, 68(6), 617-626. Higgins, J., Green, S., Cochrane Collaboration., & Wiley InterScience (Online service). (2011). Cochrane handbook for systematic reviews of interventions. Joanna Briggs Institute. (2014). Joanna Briggs Institute Reviewers’ Manual. Adelaide: The Joanna Briggs Institute.