Undergraduate and Postgraduate Medical Education

Rapid reviews are evidence synthesis projects that are conducted in an expedient manner making them a particularly good option for emerging topics across disciplines to aid in timely evidence informed decision making. As noted by Tricco et. al. (2015), a formal definition does not exist for this review type; rapid reviews omit and/or simplify components of the the systematic review process which saves time, reduces the need for intensive methodological training and streamlines the number of required personnel, but may produce bias results depending on information sources used, and steps that have been streamlined. 

Tricco et. al (2015) conducted a scoping review of rapid review methodologies and reported the following findings for where researchers chose to implement limits or streamline strategies:

"Streamlined methods that were used in the 82 rapid reviews included limiting the literature search to published literature (24 %) or one database (2 %), limiting inclusion criteria by date (68 %) or language (49 %), having one person screen and another verify or screen excluded studies (6 %), having one person abstract data and another verify (23 %), not conducting risk of bias/ quality appraisal (7 %) or having only one reviewer conduct the quality appraisal (7 %), and presenting results as a narrative summary (78 %) (Fig. 4)." (pg. 4).

In Dobbin's (2017) guidebook (which focuses on health policy practice questions), the following steps are suggested:

1. Articulate a practice question
   1. Can you identify stakeholders
   2. Can you articulate the issue?
   3. Define terms and concepts
   4. Describe the environment (political situations, community profile, important partnerships, other issues of relevance)
2. Search for (and document!) relevant research evidence from sources such as:
   1. Academic research (example: systematic/scoping reviews, environmental scans)
   2. Statistics
   3. Organizational reports
   4. Briefing notes
   5. Surveys
   6. Protocols
   7. Guidelines
   8. Manuals
   9. Frameworks
   10. Interviews/consultations with academics, field experts etc
   11. Grey Literature
3. Use Covidence
   1. To minimize bias, have two authors independently review references at title/abstract AND full text stage for data selection
   2. Flow chart is automatically generated
4. Conduct a quality appraisal of the gathered evidence
   1. Look at page 16 for a chart of suggestions
5. Synthesize the evidence
   1. Use a table for clarity and consistency
6. Adapt the evidence to the setting of the practice/research question
   1. What are the implications?
7. Implement the decision
8. Evaluate the impact of the decision

In the guide above, it is suggested that the report begins with one page of key messages followed by a two-page executive summary and the the 20 page (max) full report.

It is recommended that researchers read rapid reviews in their field to get a sense of approaches and methods reporting.

Here is a reading list to get you started:

• Tricco, A.C., Antony, J., Zarin, W. et al. A scoping review of rapid review methods. BMC Med 13, 224 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12916-015-0465-6
• National Collaborating Centre for Methods and Tools
• Dobbins, M. (2017). Rapid review guidebook. National Collaborating Centre for Methods and Tools. 1-24.