Incorporate a systematic review content type/filter into Primo
Systematic reviews are key to evidence based medicine practice. They “... establish whether scientific findings are consistent and can be generalised across populations, settings, and treatment variations, or whether findings vary significantly by particular subsets (Mulrow, 1994).” They also identify existing gaps in the literature requiring further research. The number of systematic reviews published has grown from less than 50 a year in the early 1990s to almost 36,000 in 2022 (Brignardello-Petersen, 2025) Health sciences researchers, clinicians and students would benefit from the ability to efficiently limit search results to systematic reviews in Primo with a corresponding content type/filter. Currently users must search for “systematic review” as keywords or subject terms which are inconsistently applied across CDI sources. Similar filters exist in other search platforms including PubMed and EBSCOhost CINAHL and Medline.
https://www.elsevier.com/connect/why-systematic-reviews-matter
Mulrow CD. Rationale for systematic reviews. BMJ. 1994 Sep 3;309(6954):597-9. doi: 10.1136/bmj.309.6954.597.
Brignardello-Petersen R, Santesso N, Guyatt, GH. Systematic reviews of the literature: an introduction to current methods. American Journal of Epidemiology, 2025 Feb; 194(2):536–542 doi:10.1093/aje/kwae232
JoLinda Thompson
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Michelle Kraft commented
Adding a description for systematic reviews is important because it tells users these are high-quality summaries of many studies, not just ONE review article. This helps people quickly find the most reliable evidence for research or decision-making. Without this description, users may confuse systematic reviews with regular reviews, which can lead to poor choices and wasted time. It would benefit Ex Libris to add this because it improves search accuracy and helps to make Primo a more trusted tool. The current method of searching for systematic reviews by keywords is unacceptable because it hides critical differences in quality and rigor. Ex Libris should add systematic review as a content type/filter because libraries and researchers increasingly prioritize evidence-based resources, and failing to distinguish systematic reviews undermines Primo’s value as a precision discovery platform.
This enhancement would be relatively easy to implement because systematic review is already a recognized content type and filter in the National Library of Medicine’s MEDLINE product. The metadata for systematic reviews is standardized, meaning content retrieved from MEDLINE and other medical resources is already formatted for precise filtering. By leveraging existing metadata, Ex Libris can quickly add this feature without major development work, while significantly improving search accuracy and user experience.