Nursing Research Guide:Systematic Reviews

A research guide for students in the College of Nursing and Health Sciences

Secondary Research and Systematic Reviews

Secondary Research is when researchers collect lots of research that has already been published on a certain subject. They conduct searches in databases, go through lots of primary research articles, and analyze the findings in those pieces of primary research. The goal of secondary research is to pull together lots of diverse primary research (like studies and trials), with the end goal of making a generalized statement. Primary research can only make statements about the specific context in which their research was conducted (for example, this specific intervention worked in this hospital with these participants), but secondary research can make broader statements because it compiled lots of primary research together. So rather than saying, "this specific intervention worked at this specific hospital with these specific participants, a piece of secondary research can say, "This intervention works at hospitals that serve this population."

Systematic Reviews are a kind of secondary research. The creators of systematic reviews are very intentional about their inclusion/exclusion criteria, or which articles they'll include in their review and the goal is to make a generalized statement so other researchers can build upon the practices or interventions they recommend. Use the chart below to understand the differences between a systematic review and a literature review.

Check out the video below to watch the Nursing and Health Sciences librarian describe the differences between primary and secondary research.

Comparative table

Literature Review Systematic Review Meta-Analysis
  • Very common, requires less data analysis than systemic reviews
  • Summarizes information:
    • Introduction
    • Research question
    • Key terms
    • How research was conducted
  • Critical analysis of literature
    • Assess validity and relevance
    • Compare and contrast findings
  • Used to represent and prove the importance of a topic or intervention

 

  • Formal process for appraising the literature and data available on a topic
  • Allows reader of publish review to access large amounts of data
  • Considered secondary research
  • Clearly outline what make an article and its data qualified for inclusion in the review
  • Follows scientific protocol:
    • Problem formulation
    • Data collection
    • Data evaluation
    • Analysis and interpretation
    • Public presentation
  • Adheres to international standards as per PRISMA
  • All of the characteristics of a systematic review but includes further analysis
  • Synthesizes quantitative data from the systematic review
  • Provides more objective review of the literature by making the data comprable
  • Methodological details extracted in tabular form
  • Data often presented visually
  • Very time consuming to produce
  • Quality of meta-analysis depends on quality of the data found in the systematic review