Peer review process in systematic review

► Peer-reviewed (or refereed): Refers to articles that have undergone a rigorous review process, often including revisions to the original manuscript, by peers in their discipline, before publication in a scholarly journal. This can include empirical studies, review articles, meta-analyses among others.

► Empirical study (or primary article): An empirical study is one that aims to gain new knowledge on a topic through direct or indirect observation and research. These include quantitative or qualitative data and analysis. In science, an empirical article will often include the following sections: Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion.

► Review article: In the scientific literature, this is a type of article that provides a synthesis of existing research on a particular topic. These are useful when you want to get an idea of a body of research that you are not yet familiar with. It differs from a systematic review in that it does not aim to capture ALL of the research on a particular topic.

► Systematic review: This is a methodical and thorough literature review focused on a particular research question. It's aim is to identify and synthesize all of the scholarly research on a particular topic in an unbiased, reproducible way to provide evidence for practice and policy-making. It may involve a meta-analysis (see below).

► Meta-analysis: This is a type of research study that combines or contrasts data from different independent studies in a new analysis in order to strengthen the understanding of a particular topic. There are many methods, some complex, applied to performing this type of analysis.

(Adapted from Scholarly Literature Types, Cornell University)

During my days of nursing school and research classes, we did literature reviews to determine relevant research surrounding a topic of interest. While we did learn about ensuring that studies in our literature reviews were solid, with appropriate sample, design, methods, etc., we didn’t actually compare the findings from the studies with the same intensity that we do today.

A recent webinar about evidence-based practice (EBP) really cleared up some concepts and terms for me, including the importance of using systematic reviews when examining evidence. A systematic review is an essential component for basing change in practice on current evidence. So how does a systematic review differ from a literature review?

• Peer review is a critical part of the process. A systematic review looks at evidence reported in peer-reviewed journals and the systematic review itself is peer-reviewed.
• The evidence is rigorously reviewed, using the same manner and standards that were used to produce the evidence.

We know that changing practice based on one research study is not enough. It’s not even enough to change nursing practice based on several studies. Available evidence must be investigated and interpreted using scientific review methods. A well-conducted systematic review summarizes existing research, defines the boundaries of what is known and what is not known, and helps resolve inconsistencies among diverse pieces of research evidence (Duffy, 2005).

Here’s a good example of a systematic review from the October issue of American Journal of Nursing. As you read Deactivation of ICDs at the End of Life: A Systematic Review of Clinical Practices and Provider and Patient Attitudes, pay particular attention to Table 1 where the sample, methods, and findings of each study are summarized.

References

Duffy, M. (2005). Using Research to Advance Nursing Practice: Systematic Reviews: Their Role and Contribution to Evidence-based Practice. Clinical Nurse Specialist: The Journal for Advanced Nursing Practice, 15-17.

Woods, A. (2011). Implementing Evidence Into Practice. Webinar. Philadelphia: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.

When your manuscript arrives at the journal’s editorial office it will receive an initial desk assessment by the journal’s editor or editorial office. They will check that it’s broadly suitable for the journal.

They will ask questions such as:

• Is this the right journal for this article?
• Does the paper cover a suitable topic according to the journal’s aims & scope?
• Has the author followed the journal’s guidelines in the instructions for authors? They will check that your paper meets the basic requirements of the journal, such as word count, language clarity, and format.
• Has the author included everything that’s needed for peer review? They will check that there is an abstract, author affiliation details, any figures, and research-funder information.
• Does it make a significant contribution to the existing literature?

If your article doesn’t pass these initial checks the editor might reject the article immediately. This is known as a ‘desk reject’ and it is a decision made at the editor’s discretion, based on their substantial experience and subject expertise. By having this initial screening in place, it can enable a quick decision if your manuscript isn’t suitable for the journal. This means you can submit your article to another journal quickly.

If your article does pass the initial assessment, it will move to the next stage, and into peer review.

“As an editor, when you first get a submission, at one level you’re simply filtering. A fairly small proportion do not get sent out by me for review. Sometimes they simply fall outside the scope of the journal.”

– Michael Reiss, Founding Editor of Sex Education

Step 2: First round of peer review

Next, the editor will find and contact other researchers who are experts in your field, and will ask them to review the paper. A minimum of two independent reviewers is normally required for every research article. The aims and scope of each journal will outline their peer review policy in detail.

The reviewers will be asked to read and comment on your article. They may also be invited to advise the editor whether your article is suitable for publication in that journal.

So, what are the reviewers looking for?

This depends on the subject area, but they will be checking that:

• Your work is original or new.
• The study design and methodology are appropriate and described so that others could replicate what you have done.
• You’ve engaged with all the relevant current scholarship.
• The results are appropriately and clearly presented.
• Your conclusions are reliable, significant, and supported by the research.
• The paper fits the scope of the journal.
• The work is of a high enough standard to be published in the journal.

IMPORTANT

If you have not already shared your research data publicly, peer reviewers may request to see your datasets, to support validation of the results in your article.

Once the editor has received and considered the reviewer reports, as well as making their own assessment of your work, they will let you know their decision. The reviewer reports will be shared with you, along with any additional guidance from the editor.

If you get a straight acceptance, congratulations, your article is ready to move to publication. But, please note, that this isn’t common. Very often, you will need to revise your article and resubmit it. Or it may be that the editor decides your paper needs to be rejected by that journal.

Please note that the final editorial decision on a paper and the choice of who to invite to review is always the editor’s decision. For further details on this, please see our peer review appeals and complaints policy.

Step 3: Revise and resubmit

It is very common for the editor and reviewers to have suggestions about how you can improve your paper before it is ready to be published. They might have only a few straightforward recommendations (‘minor amendments’) or require more substantial changes before your paper will be accepted for publication (‘major amendments’). Authors often tell us that the reviewers’ comments can be extremely helpful, to make sure that their article is of a high quality.

• During this stage of the process you will have time to amend your article based on the reviewers’ comments, resubmitting it with any or all changes made. Make sure you know how to respond to reviewer comments, we cover this in the next section.
• Once you resubmit your manuscript the editor will look through the revisions. They will often send it out for a second round of peer review, asking the reviewers to assess how you’ve responded to their comments.
• After this, you may be asked to make further revisions, or the paper might be rejected if the editor thinks that the changes you’ve made are not adequate. However, if your revisions have now brought the paper up to the standard required by that journal, it then moves to the next stage.

If you do not intend to make the revisions suggested by the journal and resubmit your paper for consideration, please make sure you formally withdraw your paper from consideration by the journal before you submit elsewhere.

Make sure you resubmit

Step 4: Accepted

And that’s it, you’ve made it through peer review. The next step is production

How long does peer review take?

Editorial teams work very hard to progress papers through peer review as quickly as possible. But it is important to be aware that this part of the process can take time.

1. The first stage is for the editor to find suitably qualified expert reviewers who are available. Given the competing demands of research life, nobody can agree to every review request they receive. It’s therefore not uncommon for a paper to go through several cycles of requests before the editor finds reviewers who are both willing and able to accept.
2. Then, the reviewers who do accept the request, have to find time alongside their own research, teaching, and writing, to give your paper thorough consideration.

Please do keep this in mind if you don’t receive a decision on your paper as quickly as you would like. If you’ve submitted your paper via an online system, you can use it to track the progress of your paper through peer review. Otherwise, if you need an update on the status of your paper, please get in touch with the editor.

Top tip

Many journals publish key dates alongside new articles, including when the paper was submitted, accepted, and published online. While you’re at the stage of choosing a journal to submit to, take a look at these dates for a range of recent articles published in the journals you’re considering. While each article will have a slightly different timeline, this may help you to get an idea of how long publication may take.

A 360⁰ view of peer review

Peer review is a process that involves various players – the author, the reviewer and the editor to name a few. And depending on which of these hats you have on, the process can look quite different.

To help you uncover the 360⁰ peer review view, read these interviews with an editor, author, and reviewer.

What is the peer review process for systematic review?

Peer review is the system used to assess the quality of a manuscript before it is published. Independent researchers in the relevant research area assess submitted manuscripts for originality, validity and significance to help Editors determine whether the manuscript should be published in their journal.

What are the 4 steps to peer reviewing?

Peer review follows a number of steps, beginning with submitting your article to a journal..

Step 1: Editor assessment. ... .

Step 2: First round of peer review. ... .

Step 3: Revise and resubmit. ... .

Step 4: Accepted..

What are the five steps of the peer review process?

The peer review process.

Submission of Paper. The corresponding or submitting author submits the paper to the journal. ... .

Editorial Office Assessment. ... .

Appraisal by the Editor-in-Chief (EIC) ... .

EIC Assigns an Associate Editor (AE) ... .

Invitation to Reviewers. ... .

Response to Invitations. ... .

Review is Conducted. ... .

Journal Evaluates the Reviews..

What is peer review process under review?

When the status of your manuscript changes to under review, this means that it has passed the initial editorial checks. The journal has confirmed that you've uploaded and submitted the correct documents and that the content of your paper is relevant to your journal.