Identify your research question. Formulate a clear, well-defined research question of appropriate scope. Define your terminology. Find existing reviews on your topic to inform the development of your research question, identify gaps, and confirm that you are not duplicating the efforts of previous reviews.

2) Define inclusion and exclusion criteria. Clearly state the criteria you will use to determine whether or not a study will be included in your search.

3) Search for studies. Run your searches in the databases that you've identified as relevant to your topic. Work with a librarian to help you design comprehensive search strategies across a variety of databases. Collect ALL of the retrieved records from each search into a reference manager, such as Endnote, Zotero or Mendeley Report the searches using the PRISMA-S guidelines.

4) Extract data from included studies. Use a spreadsheet, or systematic review software (e.g. Rayyan, RevMan), to extract all relevant data from each included study. It is recommended that you pilot your data extraction tool, to determine if other fields should be included or existing fields clarified.

5) Present results and assess the quality of evidence. Clearly present your findings, including detailed methodology (such as search strategies used, selection criteria, etc.) such that your review can be easily updated in the future with new research findings. Perform a meta-analysis, if the studies allow. Provide recommendations for practice and policy-making if sufficient, high quality evidence exists, or future directions for research to fill existing gaps in knowledge or to strengthen the body of evidence.