Systematic Reviews Policy
Librarian Participation in Systematic Reviews, Scoping Reviews, and Other Comprehensive Searches
A number of HSL librarians are trained in systematic and scoping review techniques and are available to join faculty and staff review teams, subject to availability.
Please read the following guidelines, and if you would like to request that a librarian join your review team, please contact us at hslinfo@mun.ca.
- Library contribution to comprehensive review searches is subject to librarian availability.
- Upon receiving a request for a systematic or scoping review search, a librarian will meet with the researcher(s) to determine the level of participation required and possible timelines.
- A librarian may participate on a review team as either a co-author or a consultant. This role depends on the nature and amount of work involved and is ideally agreed upon in advance through discussions with the primary investigator(s).
- As a member of a review team, the librarian typically does most or all of the following tasks:
- Selects databases
- Writes database-specific, reproducible search strategies
- Executes searches
- Exports results to a citation manager
- Deduplicates results
- Provides a flow chart with retrieval numbers, as recommended in the PRISMA Statement
- Writes a description of the literature search methodology to be included in the article manuscript
Turnaround time: Minimum of 3 weeks
For more information on completing a systematic review, see our Systematic Review Guide.