Bibliometrics of Systematic Reviews in Japan From the 2015 publication of Ichushi-web data.

Object: In a systematic review (SR), a systematic search of articles related to a specific clinical question is conducted in an explicit and reproducible manner, and the identified articles are critically reviewed and the results are integrated. The steps in preparing a SR can be broadly categorized as follows: clarifying the clinical question, determining the criteria for selecting papers, and the SR procedure consists of five major steps: clarification of the clinical question, determination of selection criteria, systematic search of relevant articles, critical review of the selected articles, and synthesis of the results. This study aims to explore the characteristics of SR produced in Japan, focusing on literature search in SR. Methods: I searched for research papers published in 2015 that conducted SR in Ichushi-web. Of the 250 search results (retrieved on June 15, 2017), research papers that had contracts or were available through OA or other means were extracted and examined. Result & Conclusion: Most of the research articles were selected on the basis of the criteria described in the articles, but some articles were selected on the basis of the criteria not described in the articles.The average number of databases used was 2.8. Some articles did not mention any databases or did not conduct a literature search.Although guidelines and evaluation tools for SR such as PRISMA exist, less than half of the SRs were conducted in accordance with these methods.To ensure the appropriateness of the SR performed, it is recommended that SR be performed in accordance with an appropriate protocol, and that the protocols followed be described and registered in a protocol registry.