How to Conduct and Publish Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses

“This was an excellent, informative, and engaging workshop.”

“Very organized course—it is very hard to condense that much information in a very limited time and teach such a diverse group of people. Speakers are very knowledgeable, energetic, willing to teach, and very patient.”

“It is obvious that each of [the speakers] have put a lot of work into [their] topics and [their] efforts paid off. [The] presentations were excellent and helped to put together a great 2½ days.”

“Hands-down the BEST course I’ve had.”

In a world where clinicians and patients are drowning in information, high-quality evidence summaries that follow a systematic approach to identify, select, appraise, and synthesize the research landscape have become an essential tool for clinical decision-making. Unfortunately, many systematic reviews lack the rigor needed to provide trustworthy evidence, and carrying out such research on one's own requires mastery of a number of methodological and statistical strategies.

The purpose of this interactive workshop is to arm clinicians and researchers with the skills they need to better understand primary studies and the principles of the systematic review methodology—skills that will make it possible to effectively conduct and publish high-quality systematic reviews of therapeutic interventions.

At the end of this course, participants will be able to:

• Understand the importance of evidence summaries.
• Understand the methodology for conducting systematic reviews.
• Participate and interact with a librarian in the creation of search strategies.
• Create a research question and define outcomes for a review.
• Use software to conduct screening, data extraction, and analysis.
• Assess risk of bias of randomized controlled trials.
• Implement meta-analytic techniques and interpret main summary estimates.
• Use the GRADE approach to assess the quality of evidence.
• Understand how to effectively structure a manuscript.
• Understand how journal editors prioritize scientific articles.
• Appropriately respond to peer review comments.
• Avoid typical mistakes researchers make when reporting their findings.
• Consider the application of research in clinical scenarios.

• Attendees will earn 11 continuing education (CE) credits from the ADA.*

• Daily schedule:
  • November 11: 10 AM to 3 PM CT, with optional office hours from 5 to 6 PM CT 
  • November 12: 10 AM to 3 PM CT, with optional office hours from 5 to 6 PM CT 
  • November 13: 10 AM to 12:30 PM CT
    
     
• Of note for international applicants: The course is offered only in the English language; no simultaneous interpretation is provided.

*The American Dental Association is an ADA CERP Recognized Provider.

ADA CERP is a service of the American Dental Association to assist dental professionals in identifying quality providers of continuing dental education. ADA CERP does not approve or endorse individual courses or instructors, nor does it imply acceptance of credit hours by boards of dentistry.

The American Dental Association designates this activity for 11 continuing education credits.

• Course tuition is $500 for ADA members and $700 for non-members.
• Tuition includes course materials and a copy of the book How to Use Evidence-Based Dental Practices to Improve Your Clinical Decision Making.
• Full refunds are possible up to four weeks before workshop (October 14). A partial refund of 50% is available after that.

Alonso Carrasco-Labra, DDS, MSc, PhD, serves as senior director of the ADA Science and Research Institute’s Department of Evidence Synthesis and Translation Research. He is co-principal investigator of a grant from the U.S. Food & Drug Administration to develop a national clinical practice guideline for the management of acute pain in dentistry (to be completed in 2023) and is a coauthor of upcoming ADA guidelines on caries prevention (2022), dental x-rays and cone beam CT (2022), restorative caries treatment (2022), and caries detection and diagnosis (2023). He is a member of the Cochrane Patient-Reported Outcome Methods Group, the Cochrane Applicability and Recommendation Methods Group, the Cochrane Wounds Group, the Cochrane Oral Health Group, and the GRADE Working Group. Dr. Carrasco-Labra is an author of a series of 10 articles published in the Journal of the American Dental Association titled “A Practical Approach to Evidence-Based Dental Practice" and is a co-author of the Users' Guide to the Medical Literature (3rd edition, JAMA). 

Cameron Estrich, MPH, PhD, is a health research analyst at the ADA Science and Research Institute, where she studies trends in dental practice and treatment. Dr. Estrich is currently researching COVID-19 incidence and infection control practices in dentistry as well as antibiotic prescription patterns among dentists and the prevalence of amalgam restorations among the U.S. general public.

Kelly O’Brien, MLIS, is an informationist at the ADA Library and Archives. In this role, she provides expert searching and reference assistance to ADA members and staff, including in the development of systematic reviews and clinical practice guidelines. She holds a master of library and information science from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.

Sarah Pahlke, MSc, is a clinical practice guidelines research assistant for Center for Evidence-Based Dentistry in the ADA Science and Research Institute. She is a coauthor of the ADA’s upcoming systematic reviews and guidelines on caries prevention (to be completed in 2022), restorative caries treatment (2022), and caries detection and diagnosis (2023) and is also conducting research on the utilization of patients’ values and preferences and their impact on clinical practice guidelines.

Lauren Pilcher, MSPH, is a clinical practice guidelines research assistant for Center for Evidence-Based Dentistry in the ADA Science and Research Institute. She is a coauthor of the ADA’s upcoming systematic reviews and guidelines on caries prevention (to be completed in 2022), restorative caries treatment (2022), and caries detection and diagnosis (2023) and has an interest in using artificial intelligence to manage and enhance systematic review development.

Malavika Tampi, MPH, is the manager of clinical practice guidelines produced by the ADA Center for Evidence-Based Dentistry in the ADA Science and Research Institute. She is a coauthor of the ADA’s upcoming systematic reviews and guidelines on caries prevention (to be completed in 2022), restorative caries treatment (2022), caries detection and diagnosis (2023), and acute pain management (2023).  Malavika is a member of the GRADE Working Group and the Guidelines International Network. 

Olivia Urquhart, MPH, is a health research analyst at the ADA Science and Research Institute, where she manages the ADA Clinical Evaluators Panel program. She is a coauthor of the ADA’s upcoming systematic reviews and guidelines on caries prevention (to be completed in 2022), restorative caries treatment (2022), caries detection and diagnosis (2023), and acute pain management (2023). Olivia is a member of the GRADE Working Group and the Guidelines International Network. 

J. Tim Wright, DDS, MS, is the editor of the Journal of the American Dental Association. He also serves as the James Bawden Distinguished Professor in the Division of Pediatric Dentistry and Public Health at the Adams School of Dentistry at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

For more information about this workshop, contact the ADA Center for Evidence-Based Dentistry at ebd@ada.org.