The Bahrain Branch of the UK Cochrane Centre In Collaboration with Reyada Training & Management Consultancy, Dubai-UAE Cochrane Collaboration and Systematic Review Workshop, February 2007, Dubai - UAE Dr. Zbys Fedorowicz, Dr. Dunia Al Hashimi, Dr. Ahmed Al Asfoor W09

Why do Handsearching?

Handsearching Handsearching within The Cochrane Collaboration refers to the planned searching of a journal page by page (i.e. by hand), including editorials, letters, etc., to identify all reports of randomised controlled trials and controlled clinical trials.

Handsearching (cont) All the identified trials, regardless of the topic, are sent to the United States Cochrane Center, for inclusion in CENTRAL, and forwarding to the US National Library of Medicine (NLM) for re-tagging in MEDLINE. Trials that are within the scope of a Collaborative Review Group or Field go into their specialised register of trials.

Steps involved in searching individual journals 1. Identify a search coordinator 2. Determine which journal(s) to search. 3.Train and test searchers 4. Register the intent to search a journal with the US Cochrane Centre 5. Search journal(s):

Search journal(s): 1. Examine each issue, page by page, to identify ALL reports of RCT's and CCT's. 2. Photocopy the first page of each report identified 3. Annotate each photocopy, on either the front or back, with complete citation information. 4. Classify each report as RCT or CCT. 5. Forward citations on a floppy disk to the US Cochrane Centre

Journals Handsearched by the Bahrain Branch of the UKCC 1.Neurosciences Journal (The Official Journal of Pan Arab Union of Neurological Sciences ). 2.Saudi Medical Journal 3.Bahrain Medical Bulletin 4.Journal of the Bahrain Medical Society 5.Pan Arab Journal of Neurosurgery 6.Saudi Journal of Kidney Diseases and Transplantation 7.Saudi Journal of Gastro-entrology 8.Journal of Saudi Heart Association 9.Annals of Saudi Medicine 10.Journal of Health, Social and Environmental issues

Handsearching Only 300 Arabic citations out of 14 million are on Medline Identify RCT’s in journals that are not available electronically Registered Handsearcher after completing course and test.

Register of controlled trials There is no single bibliographic database that contains references to all relevant trials – Medline has many, EMBASE has many, but there is no one source for all relevant trials in all languages and from all print sources. It was clear to the Cochrane Collaboration that there was a need for a centralized register of controlled trials. Therefore the Cochrane Collaboration decided that part of its role in supporting systematic reviews would be to create a register of controlled trials – which is called CENTRAL.

Cochrane Review Groups, Fields/ Networks, and Centers Results of hand and electronic searches: citations to reports of trials in journal articles, conference proceedings, book chapters, unpublished research, and “grey” literature such as dissertations and theses Specialized registers US Cochrane Center EMBASE Not submitted to USCC Not eligible for CENTRAL Reports relevant to Group’s scope MEDLINE Publisher (John Wiley and Sons) Publisher runs electronic searches quarterly Reports not relevant to Group’s scope Handsearch results CENTRAL final product published on The Cochrane Library CENTRAL serves as a source of trial report for Cochrane specialized registers CENTRAL Database Processing Upload and Merge of Component Files

TRAINING MANUAL FOR HANDSEARCHERS Prepared by: US Cochrane Center Latest revision: December 13, 2002 Available online – can download and read it.