After formulating the focused research question, you will be able to identify a few key concepts on your proposed topic. You may conduct a preliminary search using these keywords to make a decision on:
Includes all Cochrane Reviews (and protocols) prepared by Cochrane Review Groups. Each Cochrane Review is a peer-reviewed systematic review that has been prepared and supervised by a Cochrane Review Group according to the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions or Cochrane Handbook for Diagnostic Test Accuracy Reviews.
TRIP Pro (Turning Research into Practice)
Trip is a clinical search engine designed to allow users to quickly and easily find and use high-quality research evidence to support their practice and/or care. Other than research evidence, it also allows clinicians to search across other content types including images, videos, patient information leaflets, educational courses and news.
Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effects is the abstracts of quality assessed and critically appraised systematic reviews on health and social care interventions which has ceased publication (1994 to March 2015). It is an archive maintained by CRD and the records can also be accessed via PubMed.
An online-only open-access peer-reviewed medical journal published by BioMed Central that focuses on systematic reviews. Articles are either about specific systematic reviews or about their protocols, methodologies, findings, followup, etc. Articles can also be accessed via PubMed, Embase and Scopus.
Health technology assessment producers from Ontario, Quebec, and Alberta have partnered with the National Institute for Health Research, Centre for Reviews and Dissemination to create a common repository for Canadian HTA reports within the existing international HTA Database.
Registration is required and is free.
Epistemonikos is a collaborative, multilingual database of health evidence. It contains systematic reviews relevant for health-decision making, and other types of scientific evidence. It follows a set of selection criteria to include articles from multiple electronic databases.
DoPHER (Database of Promoting Health Effectiveness Reviews) contains details of over 2,500 reviews of health promotion and public health effectiveness. There are links for seeking out the record on PubMed and Google.
Developed their own search filters as well as appraisal tools to assign review quality rating for each review to make evidence easily accessible for evidence-informed public health decision making.
Search filters developed by healthevidence.org for MEDLINE, EMBASE and CINAHL are discussed in the paper: Lee, E., Dobbins, M., DeCorby, K. et al. An optimal search filter for retrieving systematic reviews and meta-analyses. BMC Med Res Methodol 12, 51 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2288-12-51
Evidence search provides access to selected and authoritative evidence in health, social care and public health. It includes guidance, systematic reviews, evidence summaries and patient information.
Sources include: British National Formulary, Clinical Knowledge Summaries, SIGN, the Cochrane Library and Royal Colleges, Social Care Online and GOV.UK.
The Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) Library is a repository for publications and information for policy makers, health professionals, health scientists and others with a practical or academic interest in evidence based healthcare.
U.S Department of Agriculture (USDA)’s Nutrition Evidence Systematic Review (NESR), formerly the Nutrition Evidence Library (NEL) specializes in conducting food- and nutrition-related systematic reviews to answer important public health questions by using rigorous and transparent methods to search for, evaluate, analyze, and synthesize the body of scientific evidence on topics relevant to Federal policy and programs.
Physiotherapy Evidence Database (PEDro) is a free database of over 20,000 randomised trials, systematic reviews and clinical practice guidelines in physiotherapy. The following databases: NeuroBITE, OTseeker and speechBITE were modelled on PEDro.
NeuroBITE (previously PsycBITE) is a database that catalogues studies of cognitive, behavioural and other treatments for psychological problems and issues occurring as a consequence of acquired brain impairment (ABI). These studies are rated for their methodological quality, evaluating various aspects of scientific rigour. The following 7 databases are being searched and filtered based on a pre-set criteria:
SpeechBite is an evidence based practice initiative between The University of Sydney and Speech Pathology Australia. Studies on this database include Systematic Reviews (SR), Randomised Controlled Trials (RCT), Non-Randomised Controlled Trials (non-RCT), Case Series (CS), and Single Case Experimental Design (SCED).
A database that contains abstracts of systematic reviews and randomised controlled trials relevant to occupational therapy.
*Due to a lack of funding , content on from 2016 and beyond is not as comprehensive as previously. Therefore, users are recommended to also search for more recent evidence using other freely available search engines and databases such as PEDro, and PubMed.
Campbell Collaboration (C2) helps people make well-informed decisions by preparing, maintaining and disseminating systematic reviews in education, crime and justice, and social welfare.
The Evidence for Policy and Practice Information and Co-ordinating Centre (EPPI-Centre) is part of the Social Science Research Unit at the Institute of Education, University of London. EPPI develops systematic reviews and developing review methods in social science and public policy.
The What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) was established in 2002 as an initiative of the Institute for Education Sciences (IES) at the U.S. Department of Education. Summarize and compare the evidence of the effectiveness of interventions that address school or district’s needs.
3ie funded database of policy briefs, systematic reviews and impact evaluations that generate evidence on what works in development programmes and why for policy-relevant evidence to make development more effective and improve people’s lives.. Founded in 2008, 3ie is mainly funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, UKaid through the Department for International Development and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.
Evidence-based guidance for business leaders, contains business reviews