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Systematic Reviews: Citations and Organization

Importance of Organization

With a systematic review you will be dealing with a large number of citations and articles. It is crucial to stay organized from the start in order to ensure you can easily keep track of everything. 

You have some choices in how you organize your research for systematic reviews. Citation management tools are a fairly standard way to keep track of your citations. Many include collaboration options through their online platforms so your team can work together on the same set of citations. KCU Libraries has a great Library Guide on Citation Management Tools available above. 

Another option is Rayyan QCRI (listed in detail on the Resources tab of this Library Guide). Rayyan also allows you to work collaboratively and offers the additional feature of inclusion and exclusion on each citation. 


No matter which option you chose for your systematic review, remember to document everything that you do, including any citations or articles you exclude and your reasoning. This step is a key part to a systematic review and improves the ability for other researchers to replicate your findings.