New initiative to make systematic review protocols more transparent

doi:10.1136/bmj.d1240

From trainee to consultant, BMJ Group offers doctors around the world tailored information, special events, learning resources and recruitment services at every step along their career path.

... by doctors, for doctors, for patients
We are open for entries!

Online learning

BMJ Learning

High-quality CME / CPD for doctors and other healthcare professionals. BMJ Learning features hundreds of accredited, peer-reviewed learning modules in text, video, and audio formats. Find out more

Courses and Qualifications

BMJ Masterclasses

BMJ Masterclasses, led by experts, help clinicians to use the latest evidence and recent guidelines in practice and meet their CPD/CME requirements. Find out more

Exam Preparation

The leading provider of online exam preparation, helping over 167,000 healthcare professionals to pass their exams. Find out more

onExamination

Search all BMJ news articles:

From

The BMJ iPad app brings you the best of print and online, including live links to the latest news, blogs, video, and podcasts. Get the BMJ iPad app.
Countdown to London 2012: BMJ Group's Olympics portal highlights latest Olympics and sports medicine-themed research, comment and learning
Keep up to date with cardiology: Access the latest cardiovascular medicine resources from across BMJ Group.
Our online table of contents is updated at least twice each day. Read all articles published in the last 7 days.
OPEN ACCESS: All research articles are freely available online, with no word limit. Find out more about the BMJ's open access policy. Submit your paper.

Access to the full text of this article requires a subscription or payment. Please log in or subscribe below.

Susan Mayor

¹London

The first global initiative to improve the transparency of systematic reviews was launched this week, with a website encouraging researchers to prospectively register study protocols.

The website, PROSPERO, is the first open access online facility to enable researchers planning to conduct systematic reviews to register their protocols in advance, setting out the criteria they will use to gather, analyse, and report evidence.

Systematic reviews are widely accepted as providing the best quality evidence to support decision making in health and social care because they provide the most reliable estimates of the effects of interventions. But there have been growing concerns, and examples, of systematic reviews being selective about what they report, and of unintended duplication of effort.

“PROSPERO was conceived to …