Systematic Review Toolkit
Every working document for a transparent, reproducible review, mapped to PRISMA-P and PRISMA 2020. Stop rebuilding protocol, screening, and extraction files from scratch.
The complete toolkit in one download, along with clean, high-resolution exports across every Research Gold tool.
Instant download. Prefer the whole systematic review handled for you by a PhD methodologist? Request a quote from any tool page; you pay only after you approve it.
What is inside
Two Word templates plus one formatted Excel workbook that holds every spreadsheet instrument as its own tab, with dropdown menus on the decision cells. Word files open in Word, Google Docs, or LibreOffice; the workbook opens in Excel, Google Sheets, or Numbers.
PRISMA-P Protocol Template (Word)
Every PRISMA-P 2015 section with guided prompts, ready to register on PROSPERO or OSF.
Data-Extraction Form (Word)
A pilot-ready form covering identification, methods, participants, interventions, outcomes, and results.
PRISMA 2020 Checklist
All 27 reporting items with a dropdown to mark each as reported and a column for its location.
PRISMA for Abstracts Checklist
The separate 12-item abstract checklist, so the abstract is reported as fully as the main text.
Search-Strategy Log
Record every database, the full search string, limits, and counts so the search is reproducible.
Title & Abstract Screening Sheet
Two-reviewer first-pass screening with Include/Exclude/Maybe dropdowns and a conflict column.
Full-Text Screening Sheet
Second-pass screening with a structured exclusion-reason dropdown for your PRISMA flow diagram.
Risk-of-Bias: RoB 2
The five RoB 2 domains plus overall, with a Low/Some concerns/High judgement dropdown.
Newcastle-Ottawa Scale: Cohort
Star-rating worksheet for cohort studies, with the good/fair/poor thresholds built in.
Newcastle-Ottawa Scale: Case-Control
The separate case-control instrument, with its own selection and exposure items.
GRADE Summary of Findings
A certainty-of-evidence table with a GRADE dropdown, plus a guide to rating certainty up and down.
How the toolkit fits your review
The files follow the standard review workflow end to end, so each step hands off cleanly to the next.
- 1Write and register your protocol
- 2Run and log each database search
- 3De-duplicate, then screen titles and abstracts in duplicate
- 4Screen full texts and record exclusion reasons
- 5Extract data in duplicate from included studies
- 6Assess risk of bias
- 7Rate certainty of evidence with GRADE
- 8Synthesise and report against the PRISMA 2020 checklist
Prefer to try the pieces first? Several of these documents have a free interactive version on Research Gold. Draft your search with the search strategy builder, set scope with the inclusion and exclusion criteria builder, build a one-off form with the data extraction template builder, appraise studies with the risk of bias assessment tool or the Newcastle-Ottawa scale calculator, and finish with a free PRISMA flow diagram generator. The toolkit packages all of them as editable files you keep.
Good to know
- Completely free. Every Research Gold tool also exports clean, high-resolution files at no cost.
- No account required. Click download and the files are yours instantly.
- Editable source files you adapt to your own question, not locked PDFs.
- Licensed for your own academic and research use.
Planning Your Review? We Can Take It From Here.
Protocol development, a PROSPERO-ready protocol for you to submit, comprehensive search strategy, screening, analysis, and a publication-ready manuscript. All handled by PhD methodologists.
Our promise: Free rework on search, screening, or synthesis if reviewers push back.
Will your review include a meta-analysis? Quote my systematic review and meta-analysis
Reviewed by
Dr. Sarah Mitchell
Dr. Sarah Mitchell holds a PhD in Biostatistics from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and has over 15 years of experience in systematic review methodology and meta-analysis. She has authored or co-authored 40+ peer-reviewed publications in journals including the Journal of Clinical Epidemiology, BMC Medical Research Methodology, and Research Synthesis Methods. A former Cochrane Review Group statistician and current editorial board member of Systematic Reviews, Dr. Mitchell has supervised 200+ evidence synthesis projects across clinical medicine, public health, and social sciences. She reviews all Research Gold tools to ensure statistical accuracy and compliance with Cochrane Handbook and PRISMA 2020 standards.