Abstract
India is committed to reducing childhood mortality and morbidity. This requires evidence-based policy and practice in the realm of public health. This in turn necessitates advocacy and action (among all stakeholders), focused on locally relevant issues. A collaboration to work towards this goal was forged between the Public Health Foundation of India (PHFI), United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF), India; and a team of independent researchers. As a first step, a systematic review of literature on four priority areas of newborn care (community-based interventions) and child health (acute respiratory infection, diarrheal disease, anemia), was undertaken to address important issues including epidemiology, interventions for management, and operational issues of planning, implementing, and measuring actions at a programmatic level. This paper describes the development of the methodology for undertaking these systematic reviews including the process for framing of research questions, building a research team, and executing the systematic review (literature search strategy, data extraction, analysis, and reporting). The challenges associated with ensuring robust methodology, are also described.
Article PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
Avoid common mistakes on your manuscript.
References
Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (Government of India). Child Health Programme in India. Available from: http://www.mohfw.nic.in/dofw%20website/child%20healthrti.pdf. Accessed November 11, 2010.
United Nations Millenium Development Goals. Available from: http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals. Accessed November 11, 2010.
Byrne S, Wake M, Blumberg D, Dibley M. Identifying priority areas for longitudinal research in childhood obesity: Delphi technique survey. Int J Pediatr Obes. 2008;3:120–212.
Adler M, Ziglio E (eds). Gazing into the Oracle: The Delphi Method and its Application to Social Policy and Public Health. London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers; 1996.
Smith LA, Moore RA, McQuay HJ, Gavaghan D. Using evidence from different sources: an example using paracetamol 1000 mg plus codeine 60 mg. Available from: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2288/1/1. Accessed November 10, 2010.
Betrán AP, Say L, Gülmezoglu A, Allen T, Hampson L. Effectiveness of different databases in identifying studies for systematic reviews: experience from the WHO systematic review of maternal morbidity and mortality. Available from: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2288/5/6. Accessed November 10, 2010.
Straus S, Haynes B, Glasziou P, Dickersin K, Guyatt G. Misunderstandings, misperceptions, and mistakes. Evid Based Med. 2007;12:2–3.
Akobeng AK. Principles of evidence based medicine. Arch Dis Child. 2005;90:837–840.
Mathew JL, Singh M. Evidence based child health: fly but with feet on the ground! Indian Pediatr. 2008;45:95–98.
Lyman GH, Kuderer NM. The strengths and limitations of meta-analyses based on aggregate data. Available from: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2288/5/14. Accessed November 10, 2010.
Katrak P, Bialocerkowski AE, Massy-Westropp N, SaravanaKumar VS, Grimmer KA. A systematic review of the content of critical appraisal tools. Available from: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2288/4/22. Accessed November 8, 2010.
Phillips CV. Publication bias in situ. Available from: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2288/4/20. Accessed November 13, 2010.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Electronic supplementary material
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Mathew, J.L., Shah, D., Gera, T. et al. UNICEF-PHFI series on newborn and child health, India: Methodology for systematic reviews on child health priorities for advocacy and action. Indian Pediatr 48, 183–189 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13312-011-0052-7
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13312-011-0052-7