01983nas a2200169   4500000000100000000000100001008004100002260005600043100011500099700001400214700001600228700001600244700001700260245004900277856005000326520143700376       2011                            d  c2011bNational Academies Press (US)aWashington, DC1 aInstitute of Medicine (US) Committee on Standards for Systematic Reviews of Comparative Effectiveness Research1 aJill Eden1 aLaura Levit1 aAlfred Berg1 aSally Morton00aStandards for Initiating a Systematic Review  uhttps://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK209515/3 aAbstract: This chapter describes the initial steps in the systematic review (SR) process. The committee recommends eight standards for ensuring a focus on clinical and patient decision making and designing SRs that minimize bias: (1) establishing the review team; (2) ensuring user and stakeholder input; (3) managing bias and conflict of interest (COI) for both the research team and (4) the users and stakeholders participating in the review; (5) formulating the research topic; (6) writing the review protocol; (7) providing for peer review of the protocol; and (8) making the protocol publicly available. The team that will conduct the review should include individuals with appropriate expertise and perspectives. Creating a mechanism for users and stakeholders—consumers, clinicians, payers, and members of clinical practice guideline panels—to provide input into the SR process at multiple levels helps to ensure that the SR is focused on real-world healthcare decisions. However, a process should be in place to reduce the risk of bias and COI from user and stakeholder input and in the SR team. The importance of the review questions and analytic framework in guiding the entire review process demands a rigorous approach to formulating the research questions and analytic framework. Requiring a research protocol that prespecifies the research methods at the outset of the SR process helps prevent the effects of bias.