The process of searching for studies to include in a Systematic Review, Scoping Review, or Health Technology Assessments (HTAs) may include:
- Checking previously published Systematic Reviews, Scoping Reviews, and HTAs to determine if your question has already been answered.
- Conduct searches for primary studies in multiple bibliographic databases (e.g. Medline, CINAHL and Scopus).
- Scan reference lists of relevant articles, including articles selected for the review, as well as relevant review articles.
- Check who has cited relevant articles using tools such as Google Scholar, Scopus, or Web of Science.
- Depending on your topic, you will need to search the Grey Literature such as
- Clinical trial registries
- Meeting abstracts and conference proceedings
- Clinical Practice Guidelines
- Theses and Dissertations
- Government Documents
- Institute / Association Websites (e.g. Institute of Health Economics, National Institute for Clinical Excellence, Conference Board of Canada)
- Contact, if necessary
- Authors of Relevant Articles and Reviews
- Principle investigators of ongoing studies
- Pharmaceutical Companies
- Web search engines such as Google