Department of Clinical Research, University Hospital Basel, University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland.
International Graduate Academy, Institute for Health and Nursing Science, Medical Faculty, Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Halle (Saale), Germany.
JAMA Netw Open. 2023 Feb 1;6(2):e2253198. doi: 10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2022.53198.
Improving methodological quality is a priority in the health research community. Finding appropriate methods guidance can be challenging due to heterogeneous terminology, poor indexing in medical databases, and variation in formats. The Library of Guidance for Health Scientists (LIGHTS) is a new searchable database for methods guidance articles.
Journal articles that aim to provide guidance for performing (including planning, design, conduct, analysis, and interpretation), reporting, and assessing the quality of health-related research involving humans or human populations (ie, excluding basic and animal research) are eligible for LIGHTS. A team of health researchers, information specialists, and methodologists continuously identifies and manually indexes eligible guidance documents. The search strategy includes focused searches of specific journals, specialized databases, and suggestions from researchers. A current limitation is that a keyword-based search of MEDLINE (and other general databases) and manual screening of records were not feasible because of the large number of hits (n = 915 523). As of September 20, 2022, LIGHTS included 1246 articles (336 reporting guidelines, 80 quality assessment tools, and 830 other methods guidance articles). The LIGHTS website provides a user-oriented search interface including filters for study type, specific methodological topic, research context, guidance type, and development process of the guidance. Automated matching of alternative methodological expressions (eg, enter loss to follow-up and find articles indexed with missing data) enhances search queries.
LIGHTS is a peer-supported initiative that is intended to increase access to and use of methods guidance relevant to health researchers, statisticians, methods consultants, methods developers, ethics boards, peer reviewers, journal editors, and funding bodies.
提高方法学质量是健康研究界的当务之急。由于术语的异质性、医学数据库中的索引不良以及格式的变化，寻找合适的方法指南可能具有挑战性。健康科学家指南库（LIGHTS）是一个新的可搜索数据库，用于方法指南文章。
旨在为涉及人类或人群的健康相关研究（即不包括基础和动物研究）的执行（包括规划、设计、进行、分析和解释）、报告和评估质量提供指导的期刊文章有资格获得 LIGHTS。一组健康研究人员、信息专家和方法学家不断识别和手动索引合格的指导文件。搜索策略包括对特定期刊、专门数据库的集中搜索以及研究人员的建议。目前的限制是，由于命中数量过多（n = 915 523），基于关键字的 MEDLINE（和其他一般数据库）搜索和记录的手动筛选不可行。截至 2022 年 9 月 20 日，LIGHTS 包括 1246 篇文章（336 篇报告指南、80 种质量评估工具和 830 种其他方法指南文章）。LIGHTS 网站提供了一个面向用户的搜索界面，包括用于研究类型、特定方法主题、研究背景、指导类型和指导开发过程的过滤器。替代方法表达式的自动匹配（例如，输入失访并找到索引缺失数据的文章）增强了搜索查询。
LIGHTS 是一项由同行支持的倡议，旨在增加健康研究人员、统计学家、方法顾问、方法开发人员、伦理委员会、同行评审员、期刊编辑和资助机构获取和使用与方法相关的指导的机会。
