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Literature reviews: Health: PRISMA flowchart

For level 6/7 students

Look at the 'check your progress' box at the bottom of this page to make sure you have completed all the steps for this stage of your search

Download these for your own use - the worked example shows you how to built your own PRISMA - download the blank PRISMA to use in your literature review. 

The diagram below explains the steps you need work through to complete your PRISMA. At the top of the page there is a downloadable blank PRISMA you can use in your literature review as well as a worked example. 

Check your progress

Stage of your search Things to remember
Have you recorded all the numbers for the stages of your search?
  • Have the full total of all the results, and show you you have worked with the results step by step to get down to the specific number of articles you are writing about.
  • Remember to record the names of the databases you looked in.
Have you checked you are using the right PRISMA boxes for each step of your search?
  • Go back through the example at the top of this page and check all the links
  • Remember mySearch is NOT a database, it’s a federated search engine which searches over 80+ databases simultaneously. If you click on 'Databases' on the left hand side of the mySearch screen you will see which databases have returned results