OT Capstone Project

A systematic or scoping review protocol is a document that explicitly lays out the objectives and methods for the review in advance. The benefits of taking the time to establish a protocol include:

• Consistent, pre-agreed upon actions of the research team.
• Reduced chance of arbitrary decisions.
• Decreased bias from making decisions after you have influential pieces of information.
• Anticipation of and plans for dealing with problems.
• Increased accountability and transparency.

Systematic and scoping reviews are scientific research projects in themselves, and they require developing a protocol, or plan of action, just like any other scientific study.

Protocols are one of the defining characteristics of a systematic or scoping review, in comparison with other less rigorous evidence synthesis, such as a narrative review.

Protocols are developed a priori, or before the bulk of the reviewing begins.  By stating your study intentions beforehand, this helps ensure that the review process is free from bias.

When writing your protocol, it can be helpful to look at templates or guides to help you think of what to include and consider.

PRISMA-P (link below) is a great standard to follow and can be adapted for scoping reviews if needed.

Sometimes it can also be helpful to look at other protocol examples. 

You can search in the following resources to locate systematic or scoping review protocols to use as samples.  However, it is important to note that these resources do not "certify" or "approve" the protocols they contain, so they may be of varying quality.

Some common elements of a systematic/scoping review protocol which should be decided before beginning the search process include:

• Describe the context and rationale for the review. What is it about, and why is a review required?
• Specify the review question, which should be developed using the PICO or PCC model.
• Identify the criteria for inclusion/exclusion of studies in the review.  This can include things like population characteristics (age, gender, disease/condition), study design, intervention described, outcomes measured, publication year, language, etc. 
• List the review team members and what their roles and responsibilities will be.
• Describe the search strategy, including the intended sources (i.e. databases), and the limits that will be applied (if any).
• Detail the study selection process, including how many researchers will screen the initial results, and how they will select.
• Outline what kind of data will be extracted from included studies, how many researchers will perform the data extraction, and how they will extract.
• Have a plan for how discrepancies will be resolved between team members during selection and extraction processes.
• Describe how included studies will be evaluated for quality and bias.  This step is only required for systematic reviews.

Other elements to consider prior to beginning the search process include how records will be managed, the timetable for the review, how results will be synthesized, and how the findings will be disseminated.