Search Strategy Peer Review
Pubrica’s search strategy peer review checks systematic review search strategies against the PRESS 2015 guideline for review teams, information specialists and journals. A single error in a strategy can silently remove eligible studies, and it is not visible in the finished paper. Our information specialists check the strategy line by line against the six PRESS elements, before you run it or before you publish, and return a revised strategy with each change explained and a written record for your methods section.
- The six PRESS elements: translation of the question, Boolean and proximity operators, subject headings, text word searching, spelling and syntax and line numbers, and limits and filters
- Line-by-line review: we review the strategy with the same rigour applied to code review
- Review before the search runs: after screening, a flawed strategy means rerunning every later stage
- For journals and editorial offices too, as a specialist check on submissions claiming systematic method
- Reported as a written record, as PRISMA-S reporting and peer reviewers increasingly expect
Six PRESS elements assessedIncluded
Line-by-line syntax checkIncluded
Revised strategy suppliedIncluded
Written record for the methodsIncluded
Running the search for youSeparate service
Strategy → six elements → line by line → revised → recorded
- All six elements assessed
- Checked line by line
- Revised strategy supplied
- Written record for your methods
- Completed in days rather than weeks
Service Scope
Four Components of Every PRESS Peer Review
We review a search strategy line by line, with the same rigour as a code review.
From the reviewThe most damaging PRESS finding is usually a concept translated too narrowly rather than a syntax error, because it removes a whole category of eligible studies.
From the line checkexp Diabetes Mellitus/ AND exercise OR dietPrecedence error: without brackets this returns exp Diabetes Mellitus/ AND exercise, OR everything indexed to diet. Corrected to (exercise OR diet).
From the syntax checkA wrong line number in a combination step is a common silent failure: the search runs and returns a plausible number of records, but it is not the search described in the methods.
From the filters checkAn unvalidated study design filter can remove a fifth of eligible records. Any filter used should be a named, published filter with known sensitivity.
Samples are illustrative and anonymised. Hover any one of them to play it again.
Compliance and Standards
Search Strategy Review and Reporting Standards
PRESS governs the review. PRISMA-S governs how the search is then reported.
PRESS 2015 (search peer review)
The guideline for peer reviewing an electronic search strategy, developed through CADTH — now Canada’s Drug Agency. Six elements: translation of the question, Boolean and proximity operators, subject headings, text word searching, spelling and syntax, and limits and filters.
PRISMA-S (search reporting)
The 2021 search extension to PRISMA 2020. Sixteen items covering where you searched, exactly how, when, and what you found — the detail that makes a search reproducible rather than merely described.
PRISMA 2020 (review reporting)
The reporting standard for systematic reviews: the flow of records, the search reproducibility, and the studies excluded at full text with a reason for each.
Quality management (cert. H3CR9TCU20251212INDQM10N)
How the work is run, recorded and released.
Responsible Use of AI
Our Approach to AI Use and Disclosure
AI tools support specific, checkable tasks. Editorial judgement, final wording and sign-off remain with Pubrica subject specialists.
Why we do not publish our own AI accuracy figures
Accuracy figures for AI tools are usually reported by the companies that sell them.
Pubrica therefore does not quote its own accuracy figures, as they would carry the same conflict of interest. Instead, we tell you which tool was used on your project, at which stage, and what a specialist changed afterwards.
Methodology
How Our PRESS Peer Review Process Works
The review has a defined scope and a written output, and it is completed in days rather than weeks.
Question and strategy received
The review question, the eligibility criteria and the strategy as run or as drafted, for every database.
Six elements assessed
Each PRESS element assessed in turn, with findings classified by whether they change what the search returns.
Revised strategy written
A corrected strategy supplied per database, with each change explained rather than silently applied.
Record delivered
A written report you can cite in your methods and supply as a supplement, which is what PRISMA-S reporting increasingly expects.
Our Experts
Your Search Strategy Peer Review Team
Your project is handled by a named team that stays with it from scoping to delivery. Your project coordinator introduces each team member by name before work begins.
Determines what the work can claim. Matched to your topic rather than allocated from a rota, and tells you clearly when the evidence does not support the intended conclusion.
Finds what the work is built on, and records it so somebody else could find it again. Writes the search line by line for each platform and hands it over dated and reproducible.
Reads independently of the first pass and reconciles, because most errors in this work are transcription errors rather than reasoning ones. Disagreements are logged and adjudicated, never quietly resolved.
Owns anything the numbers decide. Says before the analysis exists whether the data can answer the question, and hands over the code so the whole thing can be re-run without us.
Packages
Search Strategy Peer Review Packages
Cost depends on the number of databases the strategy covers and the complexity of the question. The engagement has a defined scope and a written output.
Before the search runs
Review teams and information specialists
Quoted per projectOn database count
Delivery Days
- ✓All six PRESS elements assessed
- ✓Line-by-line syntax check
- ✓Findings classified by impact
- ✓Revised strategy per database
- ✓Written record for your methods
Review before the search runs offers the greatest savings, because after screening a flawed strategy means rerunning every later stage.
Service Scope Request a quoteFor an editorial office
Journals assessing systematic review submissions
Quoted per projectOn volume and turnaround
Delivery To your review clock
- ✓Strategy assessed against PRESS
- ✓Reproducibility of the reported search tested
- ✓PRISMA-S reporting completeness checked
- ✓Report written for your editor, not the author
- ✓Volume arrangements available
A specialist check most editorial offices cannot staff internally, on the part of a submission that general peer reviewers rarely examine.
Service Scope Request a quoteAfter the search has run
Reviews already underway or under revision
Quoted per projectOn what has to be rerun
Delivery By scope
- ✓Strategy assessed as run
- ✓Impact of each finding estimated
- ✓Steps that need rerunning identified
- ✓Revised strategy supplied
- ✓Methods text corrected
Sometimes the search has to be rerun. If so, we will tell you rather than help describe a flawed search more carefully.
Service Scope Request a quoteSend one strategy and we will review it against all six PRESS elements free of charge, so you can see the findings before commissioning further work.
FAQs
Frequently Asked Questions About PRESS Peer Review
If your question is not answered here, ask an expert — no quote required.
Peer Review of Electronic Search Strategies — a guideline developed through CADTH, now Canada’s Drug Agency, and published as the 2015 Guideline Statement.
It sets out six elements a reviewer should check: translation of the question, Boolean and proximity operators, subject headings, text word searching, spelling syntax and line numbers, and limits and filters.
Before the search runs. That is when a finding costs you a revision to a strategy rather than a rerun of screening, extraction and synthesis.
A review after the search is still worthwhile, as reviewers and editors increasingly ask for it, but correcting the findings costs much more.
Increasingly. PRISMA-S asks for the search to be reported in enough detail to be reproduced, and a growing number of journals and funders ask explicitly whether the strategy was peer reviewed.
Reporting that the strategy was peer reviewed, and by whom, adds a line to your methods section that reviewers look for.
Yes, and this is the usual case. An independent reviewer identifies issues that the person who built the strategy may no longer see.
Where we built the strategy ourselves, we will say so and arrange an independent reviewer rather than check our own work.
Related services
Related Academic Editorial Services
Search strategy review is a short check that protects the later stages of a review.
1SYSTEMATIC REVIEWSdownstream
Systematic reviewWhere search errors have the greatest effect. Meta-analysisPooled analysis depends on the search results.2THE OTHER REVIEW FORMSsame exposure
Scoping reviewBroad questions, broader strategies. Living reviewThe strategy is rerun every month.3FOR PUBLISHERS AND JOURNALSeditorial side
Editorial office servicesSpecialist checks at scale. Statistical reviewThe other check reviewers rarely make.Request a Free PRESS Review of Your Search Strategy
You will see what the check finds on your own search before commissioning further work.