Following extensive revision to reflect current best practice, the Cochrane collaboration has published a new edition of the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions. (Version 6, published in the printed form as a 2nd edition).
A ‘gold standard’ for anyone conducting a systematic review, it describes the methods and best practices in planning, conducting and interpretation of systematic reviews to inform decision-making.
The new edition is divided into 4 parts:
- Questions related to working with Cochrane such as planning, reporting and updating a review (available online only)
- Core methods applicable to systematic reviews of interventions, from framing the question to interpreting the results, including thoroughly updated guidance on searching for and selecting studies, assessing the risk of bias, summarising studies, synthesising and presenting findings, and interpreting results
- and 4. Specific perspectives and methodological questions that are relevant to some types of reviews
Written by a team of over one hundred authors and editors it brings:
- new chapters addressing intervention complexity and equity in systematic reviews
- a new chapter on network meta-analysis
- substantial revisions of guidance on assessing the risk of bias in randomised trials and a new chapter on assessing the risk of bias in non-randomised trials
- new chapters on planning the review’s questions, comparisons and outcomes, and about planning and synthesising using methods other than meta-analysis
Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions is freely available online at https://training.cochrane.org/handbook/current
The print version is also available in our libraries for you to borrow.
The editors of the Handbook “believe this most recent revision of the Handbook will be of use to all authors, no matter how experienced in their endeavours, in meeting the ongoing challenges of providing trusted evidence to support healthcare decision making.”[1]
[1] Cumpston M, Li T, Page MJ, Chandler J, Welch VA, Higgins JPT, Thomas J. Updated guidance for trusted systematic reviews: a new edition of the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2019, Issue 10. Art. No.: ED000142. DOI: 10.1002/14651858.ED000142
