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Letter to the Editor|Articles in Press

Differentiating between mapping reviews and evidence gap maps

  • Hanan Khalil
    Correspondence
    Corresponding author. Department of Public Health, La Trobe University, School of Psychology and Public Health, 360 Collins Street, Melbourne 3000, Australia. Tel.: +613 9479 8802.
    Affiliations
    Department of Public Health, La Trobe University, School of Psychology and Public Health, Melbourne, Australia
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  • Andrea C. Tricco
    Affiliations
    Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute, St. Michael's Hospital, Unity Health Toronto, Toronto, Ontario
    Epidemiology Division and Institute of Health Policy, Management, and Evaluation, Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario
    Queen's Collaboration for Health Care Quality Joanna Briggs Institute Centre of Excellence, Queen's University, Kingston, Canada
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Published:February 18, 2023DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclinepi.2023.02.018
Differentiating between mapping reviews and evidence gap maps
Previous ArticleMapping review could be seen as a sub-type of scoping review, and differentiating between the action of mapping evidence and presentation of evidence as maps may be helpful: response to Khalil et al
Next ArticleThe DetectDeviatingCells algorithm was a useful addition to the toolkit for cellwise error detection in observational data.
      Thank you for the opportunity to reply back to the letter entitled “Mapping review could be seen as a subtype of scoping review and differentiating between the action of mapping evidence and presentation of evidence as maps may be helpful.” While we agree that there are many similarities between scoping reviews and mapping reviews, we disagree that mapping reviews are a subtype of scoping reviews. The main difference lies in the actual research question they address. Scoping reviews tend to answer questions about “what the evidence states” as opposed to “where the evidence is.” [
      • Khalil H.
      • Tricco A.C.
      Differentiating between mapping reviews and scoping reviews in the evidence synthesis ecosystem.
      J Clin Epidemiol. 2022; 149: 175-182
      ] In general, scoping reviews include extensive data extraction using either an inductive or deductive approach [
      • Pollock D.
      • Peters M.D.J.
      • Khalil H.
      • McInerney P.
      • Alexander L.
      • Tricco A.C.
      • et al.
      Recommendations for the extraction, analysis, and presentation of results in scoping reviews.
      JBI Evid Synth. 2023; 21: 520-532
      ]. The JBI (formerly Joanna Briggs Institute) Scoping Review Methodology Group published a manuscript detailing the various methods of how scoping reviews data extraction can be undertaken [
      • Pollock D.
      • Peters M.D.J.
      • Khalil H.
      • McInerney P.
      • Alexander L.
      • Tricco A.C.
      • et al.
      Recommendations for the extraction, analysis, and presentation of results in scoping reviews.
      JBI Evid Synth. 2023; 21: 520-532
      ]. Mapping reviews usually include a high level of data extraction due to the breadth of topics presented [
      • Vijayakumar L.
      • Ray S.
      • Fernandes T.N.
      • Pathare S.
      A descriptive mapping review of suicide in vulnerable populations in low and middle countries.
      Asia Pac Psychiatry. 2021; 13: e12472
      ]. Examples of data extraction for mapping reviews are the number of publications in each year, types of participants, types of studies, etc. [
      • Wood W.H.
      • Fields B.E.
      Hippotherapy: a systematic mapping review of peer-reviewed research, 1980 to 2018.
      Disabil Rehabil. 2021; 43: 1463-1487
      ] As for scoping reviews, data extraction could include characteristics of a particular concept, outcome of interest, and results and findings of studies [
      • Khalil H.
      • Shahid M.
      • Roughead L.
      Medication safety programs in primary care: a scoping review.
      JBI Evid Synth. 2017; 15: 2512-2526
      ].
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      References

        • Khalil H.
        • Tricco A.C.
        Differentiating between mapping reviews and scoping reviews in the evidence synthesis ecosystem.
        J Clin Epidemiol. 2022; 149: 175-182
        View in Article
        • Pollock D.
        • Peters M.D.J.
        • Khalil H.
        • McInerney P.
        • Alexander L.
        • Tricco A.C.
        • et al.
        Recommendations for the extraction, analysis, and presentation of results in scoping reviews.
        JBI Evid Synth. 2023; 21: 520-532
        View in Article
        • Vijayakumar L.
        • Ray S.
        • Fernandes T.N.
        • Pathare S.
        A descriptive mapping review of suicide in vulnerable populations in low and middle countries.
        Asia Pac Psychiatry. 2021; 13: e12472
        View in Article
        • Wood W.H.
        • Fields B.E.
        Hippotherapy: a systematic mapping review of peer-reviewed research, 1980 to 2018.
        Disabil Rehabil. 2021; 43: 1463-1487
        View in Article
        • Khalil H.
        • Shahid M.
        • Roughead L.
        Medication safety programs in primary care: a scoping review.
        JBI Evid Synth. 2017; 15: 2512-2526
        View in Article
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        • et al.
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        View in Article
        • Snilstveit B.
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        • Gaarder M.
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        View in Article
        • Saran A.
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        Campbell Syst Rev. 2018; 14: 1-38
        View in Article

      9. Campbell F, Tricco AC, Munn Z, Pollock D, Saran A, Sutton A, White H, Khalil H. Mapping Reviews, Scoping Reviews and Evidence and Gap Maps (EGMs) Same but Different. The ‘Big Picture’ Review Family. Systematic Reviews. In Press.

        View in Article

      Article info

      Publication history

      Published online: February 18, 2023

      Publication stage

      In Press Journal Pre-Proof

      Footnotes

      Declaration of interest: None.

      Funding: There is no funding received for this work. ACT is funded by a Tier 2 Canada Research Chair in Knowledge Synthesis.

      Identification

      DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclinepi.2023.02.018

      Copyright

      © 2023 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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