A guide to undertaking a literature review.
BACKGROUND
The National Information Service of the General Practice Evaluation Program (GPEP) produced publications relating to research undertaken under the auspices of the program with the view to adding value to such research. Two anthologies of literature reviews from GPEP research have been produced, one in 1998 and the other in 2000. A thorough guide to undertaking and writing a literature review was part of the second anthology. This paper is a shortened version of that guide.


OBJECTIVE
This paper is designed as an overview for general practitioners who wish to undertake a research project. In this overview the authors describe the reasons researchers undertake a literature review and the steps involved in conducting and writing up a review, including the development of search strategies.


CONCLUSIONS
The literature review described in this paper is a narrative review. This type of review involves performing thorough literature searches, describing how these were done, grouping findings according to themes, critically discussing findings and placing the proposed research in context.
Magarey
A
A
Department of Public Health, Flinders University, Adelaide, South Australia. anne.margery@flinders.edu.au
Veale
B
B
Rogers
W
W
D006801:Humans; D016247:Information Storage and Retrieval / Q000379:methods*; D012196:Review Literature as Topic