Piecing Together Systematic Reviews and Other Evidence Syntheses

Selected as a 2025 Doody’s Core Title

Systematic reviews and other evidence syntheses have a vital role in summarizing the literature, exploring gaps in research, prioritizing new research, and providing literature to support decision-making and evidence-based practices. Librarians adapt their practices as members of the higher education and research community. If they consult and teach with researchers, faculty, and students, review methods will likely be a part of their work.
Piecing Together Systematic Reviews and Other Evidence Syntheses: A Guide for Librarians aims to be the definitive text on systematic reviews for librarians, information professionals, and expert searchers. Starting with an introduction to evidence syntheses, the book follows the acronym PIECCESS, a framework for the 8 phases which flow through 8 processes. The 8 phases are (1) Proposal of scope; (2) Protocol registration; (3) Preliminary findings; (4) Paper completion; (5) Preserve project; (6) Promote to stakeholders; (7) Impact compilation; (8) Updating the review. The 8 processes are Plan, Identify, Evaluate, Collect, Combine, Explain, Summarize, and Share. After the processes of a review project are covered, guidance for developing and running a service is provided as well as teaching reviews and training for librarians.
The intended audience for this book is any librarian interested in consulting, collaborating, completing, or teaching reviews. It has several applications: for training librarians new to reviews, for those developing a new review service, for those wanting to establish policies for current service, and as a reference for those conducting reviews or running a service. Participating in reviews is a new frontier of librarianship, with expanded opportunities for new service, research areas, and professional activities. This book is part of the effort to standardize best practices when engaging in evidence syntheses.

Margaret J. Foster, MSLIS, MPH, is a Professor at Texas A&M University and director and founder of the Center for Systematic Reviews and Research Syntheses. With over 20 years experience working in libraries, she has consulted and collaborated on thousands of reviews across a wide variety of disciplines.
Sarah T. Jewell, Senior Scientific Librarian for Danaher Diagnostics, has over 15 years of experience as a medical librarian. She started conducting systematic reviews in 2010, launching the systematic review service at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center Library. She also formalized the systematic review service across multiple campuses at Rutgers University Libraries.