Documentation and data management
How to document your search
Depending on the type of review, it may be necessary to document both the search process that you have undertaken and record the results of your searches. Recording and demonstrating your search strategy or methodology is useful for:
- Providing clarity to the reader about your research methods
- Justifying your research process
- Helping you not to repeat work you’ve already done
It should allow for as much detail as required by your project and so that your search process and results could be theoretically reproduced for verification by your reader. It may include:
- The names and details of the databases you searched (such as Medline, CINAHL etc)
- Any limits applied to your searches (such as date ranges, languages, types of publications)
- You may also need to include details of any other sources you used, such as grey literature (such as websites and conference proceedings)
- Any organisations or individuals you contacted directly to source your evidence
- Some databases will contain a search builder or advanced searching features, with the ability to save or export the search terms and search results
How should I document my search?
Search records can be shown in various different formats, depending on your research and the requirements of your project. Your funding body, publisher or supervisor may have a preferred format. You may wish to consult with the appropriate person before designing your own method.
Below are some potential different ways of recording your searches and search results, but a combination of different formats might be required, depending on your approach.
|
|
Date of search |
Searches |
Filter used |
Database |
No. of records |
Excluded by abstract |
Excluded by full text |
Results retained |
|
18/04/20 |
(“end of life” OR “palliative care” OR “cancer care” OR terminal OR dying OR death) AND (“Care home” OR “residential care” OR “nursing home” OR “nursing care” OR “domestic care” OR hospice) AND (“pressure ulcer” OR bedsore OR “decubitus ulcer” OR “pressure sore” OR “pressure wound”) |
2010-2020; English; Journal Articles |
CINAHL EBSCO |
130 |
20 |
100 |
10 |
|
21/04/20 |
(“end of life” OR “palliative care” OR “cancer care” OR terminal OR dying OR death) AND (“Care home” OR “residential care” OR “nursing home” OR “nursing care” OR “domestic care” OR hospice) AND (“pressure ulcer” OR bedsore OR “decubitus ulcer” OR “pressure sore” OR “pressure wound”) AND (qualitative OR mixed methods OR observation OR interviews OR ethnography) |
2010-2020; English; Journal Articles |
Medline EBSCO |
96 |
87 |
7 |
2 |
|
21/04/20 |
(“end of life” OR “palliative care” OR “cancer care” OR terminal OR dying OR death) AND (“Care home” OR “residential care” OR “nursing home” OR “nursing care” OR “domestic care” OR hospice) AND (“pressure ulcer” OR bedsore OR “decubitus ulcer” OR “pressure sore” OR “pressure wound”) AND (quantitative OR questionnaire OR survey OR statistic*) |
2010-2020; English; Journal Articles |
SCOPUS |
54 |
37 |
12 |
5 |
CINAHL (EBSCOhost)
S1 (MH “Aspirin”)
S2 TX aspirin
S3 TX “acetylsalicylic acid”
S4 S1 or S2 or S3
S5 TX dementia*
S6 (MH “Dementia, Vascular”) OR (MH “Dementia, Multi-Infarct”)
S7 TX VaD
S8 TX vascular cognitive impairment*
S9 TX VCI
S10 S5 or S6 or S7 or S8 or S9
S11 S4 and S10
S12 EM 2008
S13 EM 2009
S14 EM 2010
S15 EM 2011
S16 S12 or S13 or S14 or S15
S17 S11 and S16
25 results retrieved
The complete example can be found in the appendix of the following Cochrane review:
Rand, G. and Orrell, M. (2000) ‘Aspirin for vascular dementia.’ Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, Issue 4:CD001296, pp. 1-13. [Online] [Accessed on 8th April 2020] https://www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD001296/epdf/full
SCOPUS
Searched 18 July 2012
1,147 records retrieved
(“end of life” OR “palliative care” OR “cancer care” OR terminal OR dying OR death) AND (“Care home” OR “residential care” OR “nursing home” OR “nursing care” OR “domestic care” OR hospice) AND (“pressure ulcer” OR bedsore OR “decubitus ulcer” OR “pressure sore” OR “pressure wound”) AND (qualitative OR mixed methods OR observation OR interviews OR ethnography)
12 relevant results
Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA)
You can demonstrate your searching and how you arrived at your final papers to be included (as well as indicating excluded papers) in your review by using a PRISMA flowchart template.
The PRISMA website contains further information, including a flowchart and checklist.
This video shows how you can fill in one of the templates provided by PRISMA.
If you want to see a completed example, this article includes a PRISMA flowchart created using a PRISMA template:
Diagram reproduced from Galvin, E.C, Wills, T. and Coffey, A. (2017) ‘Readiness for hospital discharge: a concept analysis.’ Journal of Advanced Nursing, 73(1) pp. 2547-2557
Research data management (RDM)
Research data management is the process of thinking about what will happen to your data throughout the entire research lifecycle (creation, processing, analysis, storage, re-use).
The benefits of research data management are wide-ranging and include:
- Meeting funder requirements on open research
- Increased citations and greater impact of your research
- Ensuring that your research evidence is properly backed up and protected against file loss/corruption
It is vital that you:
- Save all your search strategies
- Keep notes - copy and paste into a word document to collate for an appendix
- Use a tool such as EndNote to help store and manage your references and to create bibliographies
In terms of literature searches, EndNote is available to all university staff and students. It is a useful tool for managing the search results of a systematic review, as its primary function is as a bibliographic records management system.