4.4.7.1 Search strategy

The search strategy section of a review report should provide explicit and clear information regarding all information sources that were actually used in the review, and the actual strategies used for searching. The review report should provide details regarding all information sources that were used in the review: electronic bibliographic databases; trial registers; relevant journals; websites of relevant organizations; etc. The review report, ideally, should specify all the details (a line-by-line description) of the actual search strategy used for each electronic bibliographic database used for the review and should be provided in an appendix. The review report should specify the timeframe for search, the date of last search for each database, and any language and date restrictions, with appropriate justifications.