"A scientific investigation that focuses on a specific question and that uses explicit, planned scientific methods to identify, select, assess, and summarize the findings of similar but separate studies. It may or may not include a quantitative synthesis of the results from separate studies (meta-analysis) depending on the available data." IOM p 1.
Systematic review is with minimized bias, based on specific question and criteria with a pre-planned protocol, evaluates quality of evidence.
Both systematic and literature reviews are used to provide a summary of the existing literature or research on a specific topic. The table on the right provides an explanation as well as the differences between systematic and narrative literature reviews (Kysh, Lynn (2013): Difference between a systematic review and a literature review. [figshare]. Available at: http://dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.766364)
Planning and conducting a systematic review is a time intensive research project. Time to completion will vary depending on the scope of the review and the size and availability of the review team. A well-designed systematic review may take a year or more to complete.
The Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions provides the following table showing estimated time for each task.
The guide adapted with the permission of Health Sciences Library System-University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. http://hsls.libguides.com/
Thus guide included content from Systematics Reviews published under the license CC BY-SA 4.0 by University of Groningen
