SJSU Research Guides: Evidence Synthesis & Systematic Review Program @ SJSU: Identify the Question

Framing the Question

Your research question will guide the type of evidence synthesis you should perform. Question frameworks will help you create your question in a searchable way. A recent rapid review of question frameworks identified more than 30 question frameworks in the published literature (Booth A, et al., 2023). The two most commonly used question frameworks in health sciences reviews are below. For a great overview of question frameworks, including fields outside of the health sciences, refer to the Framing a Research Question research guide published by the University of Maryland Libraries.

PICO

The PICO Framework is used for systematic reviews pertaining to clinical research questions, where

P stands for patient, population, or problem of interest,
I stands for intervention,
C stands for comparison or control, and
O stands for outcome or outcomes.

Sometimes PICO becomes PICOT, where the T stands for timeframe.

PCC

The PCC Framework is primarily used for scoping reviews, where

P stands for population,
C stands for concept, and
C stands for context.

Has this question already been answered?

Before you begin an evidence synthesis project, you should determine if there are existing or in-progress reviews on your topic. The following links are for protocol registers and collections of published/completed evidence syntheses. Note: Some journals will publish evidence synthesis protocols. Therefore you should also search bibliographic databases (e.g. PubMed or Web of Science), as well individual journal titles (e.g. JBI Evidence Synthesis or Campbell Systematic Reviews).

Health Sciences

Epistemonikos
Epistemonikos is a collaborative, multilingual database of health evidence. It is the largest source of systematic reviews relevant for health-decision making, and a large source of other types of scientific evidence.
JBI Evidence Synthesis
JBI Evidence Synthesis publishes manuscripts encompassing evidence synthesis and health care. The journal publishes systematic and scoping review protocols, diverse types of systematic reviews, and scoping reviews covering multidisciplinary health care-related topics that follow methodology and methods developed or endorsed by JBI. Authors must pay a fee to publish their protocol in JBI Evidence Synthesis.
JBI Systematic Review Register
Please note: this register is for the use of JBI affiliated entities ONLY. Registration of a systematic review title on the JBI website is to promote collaboration between affiliated entities via highlighting current work to other JBI review authors and to recognise that the registered topic is currently in development to avoid any unintended and/or unnecessary duplication of research effort.
NIHR Centre for Reviews and Dissemination DARE
Archived version of The Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effects (DARE) and the NHS Economic Evaluation Database (NHS EED). No new records have been uploaded since funding ceased in 2015. CRD commits to maintaining archived versions of DARE and NHS EED until at least March 2024.
PROSPERO International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews
PROSPERO is an international database of prospectively registered systematic reviews in health and social care, welfare, public health, education, crime, justice, and international development, where there is a health related outcome. PROSPERO accepts registrations for systematic reviews, rapid reviews and umbrella reviews. PROSPERO does not accept scoping reviews or literature scans. Sibling PROSPERO sites registers systematic reviews of human studies and systematic reviews of animal studies.

Beyond the Health Sciences

CEE Evidence Synthesis Library
This Library contains all evidence syntheses that have been approved by CEE. Browse or search using titles, keywords, or author names.

Multidisciplinary

International Platform of Registered Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis Protocols
Researchers pay a fee to publish their evidence synthesis protocols with INPLASY. The protocols are not peer-reviewed, nor are they assessed for methodological quality.
OSF Registries
OSF Registries is part of the Open Science Framework platform. Registrations create time stamped, read-only versions of a project. Use this to preregister a hypothesis and analysis plan, or keep a snapshot of work before peer review. Files in your project can be modified, but the files in the registration can not. More information can be found on the OSF Support page.
Protocols.io
Protocols.io is another fee-based option for publishing research protocols that accepts evidence syntheses. Protocols are not peer-reviewed, nor are they evaluated for methodological quality.