What's Inside a Systematic Review? (University Thesis edition)
- Daniel Amartya
- Jun 23, 2020
- 2 min read
A systematic review is a literature review that uses a systematic method to collect secondary data. The author then critically appraises the data and synthesises it quantitatively or qualitatively. The product of the review is then presented in a manuscript (hopefully the author can create a review that is worth publishing).
But what should we put into our manuscript? I personally start by identifying where we can publish the manuscript. JAMA (Journal of American Medical Association) is one of the top rated journals and my preferred guideline on what to include into the manuscript.
In regard to a university thesis, the Instruction for Authors set by JAMA only serve to give a rough idea of what to include since the word limit of a university thesis is often 2-3 times larger than the word limit set by JAMA (3000 word limit and a maximum of 5 tables).
Hence, my recommendation is to combine the JAMA Instruction for Authors (systematic review), the PRISMA Checklist, and AMSTAR checklist to ensure that we create a high quality systematic review.
What can we take from the JAMA Instruction for Authors?
Estimate the number of words we should allocate to each component of the basic structure of the systematic review.
Abstract = 350 words (not included in the word limit)
Introduction = 250 / 3000 words (8%)
Methods = 250 / 3000 words (8%)
Results = 1250 / 3000 words (41%)
Discussion = 1000 / 3000 words (33%)
Conclusion = 250 / 3000 words (8%)
Hence, if your word limit is for example 7500 words, then 600 words (.08 * 7500) should be allocated for the introduction and so on.
Since a University Thesis is scored by the academic staff and the respective supervisors, it is best to ask for a rubric on how the review is scored. We should include relevant pieces of information that would maximise the score of the review based on the given rubric.
What can we take from the PRISMA checklist?
The academic staff and supervisors will probably expect students to follow the PRISMA checklist since this is the standard protocol used to write a systematic review.
Important tables and figures to include based on the PRISMA checklist:
Methods
Table 1. Inclusion and Exclusion criteria (based on the PICO)
Results
Table 2. Risk of bias assessment and critical appraisal
Table 3. Characteristics of study (based on the PICO)
Figure 1. PRISMA flowchart
Table 4. and Table 5. Supplementary tables used for the discussion summarising important pieces of information (more tables if you have multiple secondary aims)
Appendix
Search strategy on the respective online medical databases
Data extraction form
List of included and excluded studies
What can we take from the AMSTAR 1 checklist?
Get as many "yes" as possible lel. Pretty simple
Comments