A high-yield strategy to identify randomized controlled trials for systematic reviews.

Abstract

Hand search of entire journals remains the most accurate method for identification of the eligible reports, but it is the most time-consuming. The MEDLINE search was faster, but it failed to identify at least 13% of the indexed eligible reports. Ideally, both hand search and MEDLINE should be used. The combination of MEDLINE with hand search restricted to letters and abstracts might be an acceptable alternative for reviewers with insufficient funds to support a full hand search process.