PPT Slide
Results: The initial broad search identified 12,374 citations. Of these the physicians reviewed a convenience sample of 3298 citations. Of these, 323 true hits were found. A combination of search terms that identified 93% of the 323 hits was found. The search strategy was tested of the remaining 9076 citations. We found that individual terms were inadequate to ensure sensitivity of retrieval. Nine percent of true hits would have been found with the single text word “adverse”, 86% with the subheading “AE” and 86% with the MeSH term “Case report”. The best combination of terms was "(AE or CO or PO).fs. or Case report/ and human/". This strategy captured 99% of ADRs.
Conclusions: ADRs of drugs can be identified with high sensitivity and without seeking or preselecting specific ADRs. Further work is ongoing to test the generalizability of the strategy to other drugs.