title: Rapid Review Summit: an overview and initiation of a research agenda.
abstract: The demand for accelerated forms of evidence synthesis is on the rise, largely in response to requests by health care decision makers for expeditious assessment and up-to-date information about health care technologies and health services and programs. As a field, rapid review evidence synthesis is marked by a tension between the strategic priority to inform health care decision-making and the scientific imperative to produce robust, high-quality research that soundly supports health policy and practice. In early 2015, the Canadian Agency for Drugs and Technologies in Health convened a forum in partnership with the British Columbia Ministry of Health, the British Columbia Centre for Clinical Epidemiology and Evaluation, the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, and the University of Pennsylvania. More than 150 evidence synthesis producers and end users attended the Rapid Review Summit: Then, Now and in the Future. The Summit program focused on the evolving role and practices of rapid reviews to support informed health care policy and clinical decision-making, including the uptake and use of health technology assessment. Our discussion paper highlights the important discussions that occurred during the Rapid Review Summit. It focuses on the initial development of a research agenda that resulted from the Summit presentations and discussions. The research topics centered on three key areas of interest: (1) how to conduct a rapid review; (2) investigating the validity and utility of rapid reviews; and (3) how to improve access to rapid reviews.
authors.affiliation: Canadian Agency for Drugs and Technologies in Health (CADTH), 600-865 Carling Ave., Ottawa, ON, K1S 5S8, Canada. Juliep@cadth.ca.|School of Epidemiology, Public Health and Preventive Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa, 451 Smyth Road, Ottawa, Ontario, K1H 8M5, Canada. Juliep@cadth.ca.
authors.forename: Julie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Polisena
authors.affiliation: Knowledge Synthesis Group, Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, 501 Smyth Road, Ottawa, Ontario, K1H 8L6, Canada. cgarritty@ohri.ca.|Translational Research in Biomedicine (TRIBE) Graduate Program, University of Split School of Medicine, Šoltanska 2, 21000, Split, Croatia. cgarritty@ohri.ca.
authors.forename: Chantelle
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Garritty
authors.affiliation: ECRI Institute - Penn Medicine AHRQ EPC and the Center for Evidence-Based Practice and the Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA. craig.umscheid@uphs.upenn.edu.
authors.forename: Craig A
authors.initials: CA
authors.lastname: Umscheid
authors.affiliation: Canadian Agency for Drugs and Technologies in Health (CADTH), 600-865 Carling Ave., Ottawa, ON, K1S 5S8, Canada. chrisk@cadth.ca.
authors.forename: Chris
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Kamel
authors.affiliation: Strategic Projects Branch, BC Ministry of Health, 5th floor, 1483 Douglas Street, PO BOX 9634 STN PROV GOVT, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. kevin.samra@gov.bc.ca.
authors.forename: Kevin
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Samra
authors.affiliation: Canadian Agency for Drugs and Technologies in Health (CADTH), 600-865 Carling Ave., Ottawa, ON, K1S 5S8, Canada. jeannettes@cadth.ca.
authors.forename: Jeannette
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Smith
authors.affiliation: Canadian Agency for Drugs and Technologies in Health (CADTH), 600-865 Carling Ave., Ottawa, ON, K1S 5S8, Canada. annv@cadth.ca.
authors.forename: Ann
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Vosilla
mesh_terms: D022126:Access to Information; D035843:Biomedical Research; D002170:Canada; D003695:Delivery of Health Care; D019317:Evidence-Based Medicine; D006291:Health Policy; D006801:Humans; D012107:Research Design; D012196:Review Literature as Topic; D013673:Technology Assessment, Biomedical