PRISMA-P Systematic Review Protocol Template — Free

The 17 PRISMA-P 2015 Checklist Items

Moher et al., BMJ 2015;349:g7647 · Shamseer et al., BMJ 2015;349:g7647.

#	Item	What to include
1	Title	Identify the report as a systematic review or meta-analysis protocol in the title.
2	Registration	PROSPERO registration number (or similar registry). State if not yet registered.
3	Authors	Author names, institutional affiliations, and contact details.
4	Amendments	Plan for recording any protocol amendments if the protocol is updated.
5	Support	Funding sources and role of the sponsor (if any) in the review.
6	Eligibility criteria	Study characteristics, participants (PICO: population, intervention, comparator, outcomes), and report characteristics that define eligibility.
7	Information sources	All databases, registers, grey literature sources, and contact with study authors.
8	Search strategy	Full search strategy for at least one database, including limits.
9	Study records	Process for study selection, data management, and handling duplicates.
10	Data collection	Data items to extract and the process for obtaining missing data.
11	Outcomes	Primary and secondary outcomes, and how they will be prioritised.
12	Risk of bias	Tool for assessing risk of bias (e.g., Cochrane RoB 2.0, ROBINS-I, NOS).
13	Data synthesis	Statistical methods: meta-analysis approach, heterogeneity (I²), subgroups.
14	Meta-bias	Assessment of publication bias (e.g., funnel plot, Egger's test).
15	Confidence	GRADE approach for assessing the certainty of evidence.
16	Language	Language restrictions and approach to non-English literature.
17	Authors' contributions	Planned contributions of each author to the review process.

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Key questions about systematic review protocols

Do I need to register my systematic review before starting?

PROSPERO registration is strongly recommended and required by many journals before you begin data extraction. It establishes primacy, prevents duplication, and reduces reporting bias. Registration is free via the University of York.

What is the difference between PRISMA and PRISMA-P?

PRISMA (2020) is the reporting guideline for completed systematic reviews. PRISMA-P (2015) is the guideline for systematic review protocols — describing what you plan to do before you do it. You need PRISMA-P for PROSPERO registration.

Which risk of bias tool should I use?

Use Cochrane RoB 2.0 for randomised trials and ROBINS-I for non-randomised studies. For diagnostic accuracy studies, QUADAS-2. For animal studies, SYRCLE. GRADE is the standard for certainty of evidence across all study types.