Conducting a Literature Review

Most readers will decide whether your article is relevant based on a review of this section, so make it count!

A structured abstract is broken down into these sections:

• Background or Objective
• Methods
• Results
• Conclusions 

An unstructured abstract is a paragraph that provides a general overview of the paper. Include a condensed version of each of your paper's sections as applicable:

• Background
• Objectives
• Data sources
• Study eligibility criteria
• Participants
• Interventions
• Study appraisal methods
• Synthesis methods
• Results Limitations
• Conclusions
• Implications

General components of a literature review include:

• Abstract
• Introduction
• Methods
• Discussion
• Conclusion
• References

Sometimes called the "Background," this section highlights why your review is important. 
Discuss the:

• Problem
• Incidence
• Impact on lives
• Standard management
• Other related reviews
• What your review adds to the literature

State your review's objective in light of all of the above information. This is where you include your research question.

This section covers how you went about conducting your review.

• Search strategy, including Information sources, date searched, and terms
• Inclusion and exclusion criteria
• Study selection process
• Data extraction method
• If and how bias or quality was formally assessed in individual studies, such as with the use of the EPHPP Quality Assessment Tool, CASP Checklists or CEBM's critical appraisal tools
• Principal summary measures (for example, risk ratio, difference in means)
• Any additional analyses

This section covers how you synthesize your data.

Study Selection
This is where you may include a flow diagram showing:

• Number of records screened
• Number of full-text papers assessed for eligibility
• Number included in the review
• Reasons for exclusion

Study Characteristics
Depending on the study, you may include a brief summary or chart of the characteristics of each included study, including the sample size, study design or other pertinent information as it relates to your research question.​

This is where you will summarize the major findings from your review.

Summary of Evidence

• Favor a treatment?
• Clearly show that one diagnostic test is better than another?
• Indicate that there isn't enough evidence to support a decision?

Provide results of any other analysis discussed in the Methods section.

Limitations
Describe the limitations of your included studies and your own review. Address any questions readers might have about the validity of your results.

• Problems with data
• Bias
• Quality and availability of data

Conclusions
Give a general interpretation of your results and state the implications:

• Further study
• Knowledge gap
• Guidelines
• Change to current practice
• Comparison to existing literature reviews

Be clear about the role funding played in your review.

• What is the funding source?
• Did the funder also supply data?
• Is there any other way funding played a part in the review?