Sampson 2016

Appraisal of: "Sampson M. Complementary approaches to searching MEDLINE may be sufficient for updating existing systematic reviews. J Clin Epidemiol 2016; 78: 108-115. "


Reviewer(s):

Siw Waffenschmidt
Elke Hausner


Full Reference:
Sampson M. Complementary approaches to searching MEDLINE may be sufficient for updating existing systematic reviews. J Clin Epidemiol 2016; 78: 108-115.


Short description:

The aim of the article was to test whether the combined approach of a focused Boolean search paired with a second search using the similar articles feature of PubMed or support vector machine (SVM) can yield high recall with reasonable precision.

The general approach of a Boolean plus a ranking search is effective in MEDLINE retrieval for systematic reviews. Very high levels of identification of relevant MEDLINE records, with adequate precision, are possible using a focused Boolean search complemented by a document similarity or ranking method.


Limitations stated by the author(s):

There are two limitations to our proposed strategy. Other databases should be searched in the unusual event that numerous studies, representing more than a small proportion of the total N, are not included in MEDLINE. Second, when it is important to find articles too new to be indexed by MEDLINE, systematic reviewers may wish to conduct a simple PubMed search limited to the nonindexed subsets [31,32].

Limitations stated by the reviewer(s):

It is not possible to reproduce or use the support vector machine functionality.

Study Type:

Single study

Related Chapters:


Tags:

  • Journal articles

  • Designing strategies: general

  • Pearl growing

  • Updating