Course Descriptions:

The course will equip students with the principles, methods and critiques of systematic reviews. The course will also explain the difference between a systematic review and a meta-analysis, and outline the criteria by which to judge whether these are any good. The concept of the study heterogeneity will be introduced as a way of justifying the random-effects model. Risk of bias and publication bias will also be discussed.

This course will take the students through the process of doing a systematic review and will focus on the practicalities rather than the theory. It will consider the practical aspects of:

• question formulation
  

• study identification
  

• appraisal of risk of bias
  

• data extraction and collection
  

• statistical synthesis
  

• reporting
  

The course will take place around 16 sessions. Students will be encouraged to identify a topic for a systematic review that they would like to discuss in detail during the course.