Checking existing reviews/protocols ensures that you are not repeating someone else’s work and that you are not wasting resources. It is always necessary to check whether a systematic review answering your question has already been conducted, or is currently being undertaken. This may help you in choosing or refining a review topic. These sources are useful for determining whether a recent review has already been performed on your topic:
| PROSPERO | International register of prospective systematic reviews |
| Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews | Covers all areas of medicine and health |
| Joanna Briggs Institute EBP Database (OVID) | Primarily covers nursing disciplines, with more medical and allied health content available recently |
| DoPHER | Covers both systematic and non-systematic reviews of effectiveness of health promotion and public health worldwide |
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DARE - Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effects NOTE: no longer active - records available until 31st March 2015 |
Contains thousands of systematic reviews including several quality assessed reviews |
| The Campbell Collaboration online library | Covers the fields of education, crime and justice, social welfare, international development and nutrition |
| EPPI-Centre knowledge library | Covers a wide range of topics including health conditions, education and social policy, health promotion and public health and health systems and development |
| NeuroBITE - formerly PsycBITE | Covers cognitive, behavioural and other treatments for psychological problems in Acquired Brain Impairment |
| OTseeker | Occupational therapy interventions |
| PeDRO | Physiotherapy evidence database |
| SpeechBITE | Speech pathology treatment evidence |
| TRIP - Turning research into practice | Clinical search engine which located high-quality research evidence, including systematic reviews |