2.4.5 Search Requirements for Your Review

Following completion and acceptance of the protocol, the next stage of the search should be conducted. This involves translating the search strategy from the primary database to all other relevant databases and searching any grey literature sources, if this is stated in the protocol. There is no one single source for evidence synthesis (Solomons & Hinton 2021), just as there is no prescribed number of databases to search, although most reviews search at least three, and this number has been increasing (Lam & McDiarmid 2016). Databases should be relevant to the question based on both topic and geography. As an example, a review considering a question relevant to nursing practice should search CINAHL, while a psychology review should search PsycINFO, or something similar depending on availability. A review about an issue highly prevalent in Latin America should search LILACS (Latin American and Caribbean Center on Health Sciences Information). The date on which the search was conducted, the platform used, and all search terms, languages and limits for all databases should be recorded in an appendix of the review.