The initial search was implemented on June 17, 2011, in four electronic databases: MEDLINE/PubMed (biomedical sciences, 1946–present), SciVerse Scopus (multidisciplinary; 1823–present), CINAHL/EBSCO (nursing and allied health; 1981–present) and Current Contents Connect/ISI Web of Knowledge (multidisciplinary current awareness; 1998–present). The databases were selected to be comprehensive and to cover a broad range of disciplines. No limits on date, language, subject or type were placed on the database search. The search query consisted of terms considered by the authors to describe the scoping review and its methodology: scoping review, scoping study, scoping project, literature mapping, scoping exercise, scoping report, evidence mapping, systematic mapping, and rapid review. The search query was tailored to the specific requirements of each database (see Additional file 1).
Applying the same search string that was used for the search in SciVerse Scopus (Elsevier), a web search was conducted in SciVerse Hub (Elsevier) to identify gray literature. The a priori decision was made to screen only the first 100 hits (as sorted by relevance by Scopus Hub) after considering the time required to screen each hit and because it was believed that further screening was unlikely to yield many more relevant articles (Stevinson and Lawlor, 2004 (link)). The following websites were also searched manually: the Health Services Delivery Research Programme of the National Institute for Health Research (http://www.netscc.ac.uk/hsdr/ ), the National Co-ordinating Centre for NHS Service Delivery and Organisation (http://php.york.ac.uk/inst/spru/pubs/main.php ), NHS Evidence by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (http://evidence.nhs.uk/ ), the University of York Social Policy Research Unit (http://php.york.ac.uk/inst/spru/pubs/main.php ), the United Kingdom's Department of Health (http://www.dh.gov.uk/en/index.htm ), and Google (http://www.google.com ).
The reference lists of 10 randomly selected relevant articles (Hazel, 2005 ; Vissandjee et al., 2007 ; Gagliardi et al., 2009 ; Meredith et al., 2009 ; Bassi et al., 2010 (link); Ravenek et al., 2010 (link); Sawka et al., 2010 (link); Churchill et al., 2011 (link); Kushki et al., 2011 (link); Spilsbury et al., 2011 (link)) and eight review articles on scoping reviews (Arksey and O'Malley, 2005 ; Anderson et al., 2008 (link); Davis et al., 2009 (link); Grant and Booth, 2009 (link); Hetrick et al., 2010 (link); Levac et al., 2010 (link); Rumrill et al., 2010 (link); Armstrong et al., 2011 (link)) were manually searched to identify any further scoping reviews not yet captured. A ‘snowball’ technique was also adopted in which citations within articles were searched if they appeared relevant to the review (Hepplestone et al., 2011 ; Jaskiewicz and Tulenko, 2012 ).
A follow-up search of the four bibliographic databases and gray literature sources was conducted on October 1, 2012 to identify any additional scoping reviews published after the initial search [see Additional file 1]. A search of Google with no date restrictions was also conducted at this time; only the first 100 hits (as sorted by relevance by Google) were screened.
Applying the same search string that was used for the search in SciVerse Scopus (Elsevier), a web search was conducted in SciVerse Hub (Elsevier) to identify gray literature. The a priori decision was made to screen only the first 100 hits (as sorted by relevance by Scopus Hub) after considering the time required to screen each hit and because it was believed that further screening was unlikely to yield many more relevant articles (Stevinson and Lawlor, 2004 (link)). The following websites were also searched manually: the Health Services Delivery Research Programme of the National Institute for Health Research (
The reference lists of 10 randomly selected relevant articles (Hazel, 2005 ; Vissandjee et al., 2007 ; Gagliardi et al., 2009 ; Meredith et al., 2009 ; Bassi et al., 2010 (link); Ravenek et al., 2010 (link); Sawka et al., 2010 (link); Churchill et al., 2011 (link); Kushki et al., 2011 (link); Spilsbury et al., 2011 (link)) and eight review articles on scoping reviews (Arksey and O'Malley, 2005 ; Anderson et al., 2008 (link); Davis et al., 2009 (link); Grant and Booth, 2009 (link); Hetrick et al., 2010 (link); Levac et al., 2010 (link); Rumrill et al., 2010 (link); Armstrong et al., 2011 (link)) were manually searched to identify any further scoping reviews not yet captured. A ‘snowball’ technique was also adopted in which citations within articles were searched if they appeared relevant to the review (Hepplestone et al., 2011 ; Jaskiewicz and Tulenko, 2012 ).
A follow-up search of the four bibliographic databases and gray literature sources was conducted on October 1, 2012 to identify any additional scoping reviews published after the initial search [see Additional file 1]. A search of Google with no date restrictions was also conducted at this time; only the first 100 hits (as sorted by relevance by Google) were screened.
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