The Nottingham Guide: How to do a literature review

Abstract

Trainee Psychiatrists in the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) are expected to undertake a systematic review as part of their Specialty Trainee (ST) 4-6 Higher Training. In my role as Senior Knowledge Specialist, I support these trainees by attending a quarterly research workshop, where trainees and mentoring consultants share knowledge and experience and support each other through the process of undertaking a systematic review. The aim is to understand the process, select an appropriate question (preferably CAMHS-based), and go through all the steps of a systematic review. Some go on to publish, but that’s not a requirement. My role is to advise on scoping the topic (has it already been published?), establish the search strategy, either run the search or provide training to the trainees on searching the databases, provide support on referencing, comply with PRISMA, peer-reviewmanuscripts, and find target journals to publish in. In 2016, the consultants decided to write a formal guide to support the trainees undertaking the review process, as well as the trainers to refer to when advising how to undertake a review. The aim was to circulate it amongst anyone who was interested in undertaking a review as part of their training. When the library was asked to join the workshop in 2017, they asked me to review the content of the guide, and between the four of us (three consultants and myself), we created “How to do a literature review: A guide for Specialty Trainees”.It goes through choosing a subject, arranging a meeting with the library, performing a scoping search, registering with PROSPERO, performing a search, title/abstract screening, grouping articles into topics, data extraction, writing the paper, and peer-reviewing and feedback. In July 2025, the Chair of the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Specialist Advisory Committee from the Royal College of Psychiatrists emailed to say the guide was discussed at the faculty meeting and asked for our permission to upload the guide to the faculty website. It was renamed “The Nottingham Guide” and is now available to read under the section “How to do a literature review”: Guide to research for child and adolescent psychiatry