Through systematic literature reviews, clinical and cost effectiveness of a drug or an intervention is established. For instance, several drugs may be used to treat a certain condition with all of them claiming to be the best drugs in treating the particular condition. In the absence of a systematic literature review, it would be very hard to identify a drug that can be accurate in treating a certain condition and the accessibility of the drug to the consumers in terms of cost effectiveness.
Therefore, systematic literature review establishes whether a drug is medically fit to be used by consumers and the side effects that various drugs set to treat a certain condition pose on the health of the patient. As suggested by (Macfarlane, Kyriakidou, Paul, Peacock, & Trisha, 2005), it is through comparisons of various drugs and that users of medical information can only be assured of having the best drugs. Interventions on the other hand are reviewed in terms of their ethicality and their contribution in improving population health.
According to (Macfarlane, Kyriakidou, Paul, Peacock, & Trisha, 2005), systematic reviews are believed to be the only way through which the public can be informed and influenced into proper health decision making. Consumers generally make health decisions based on the literature that is available in the market. However, the amount of information available to the consumer is overwhelming and mostly misleading information associated with single studies and therefore biased.
Systematic reviews provide an avenue through which information is collected in a transparent manner and studies are appraised accordingly. Systematic reviews do not put emphasis on the researcher who may have conducted the study, rather than they put emphasis on the research. Issues regarding favoritism of researchers’ work are eliminated and studies are therefore appraised accordingly. Consumers are exposed to reliable information synthesized by experts and which is not misleading. A systematic review draws the attention of policymakers, practitioners and researchers by providing useful information.
(Spector, & Thompson, 1991, argues that the researchers and practitioners, the information can be used in identifying a health problem and showing them the best way of using the available resources in light of solving a health problem. This can also be done through identifying gaps that exist between different studies selected for systematic literature reviews and using the information to bridge the gaps in research and eventually come up with ways of solving a particular health problem.
Researchers and practitioners also evaluate whether interventions that have been developed work and whether they are cost effective to the people they are developed for. According to Anderson, Brown, & Fielding (2005), policy makers find systematic literature reviews important for they are able to judge among competing policies and also make proper judgments even when they are being pressurized. Reliable information is available to policy makers governing the way they make decisions on health policies.
Policy makers no longer make health decisions based on incomplete and unreliable information for systematic literature review provides information in a detailed and carefully assessed manner. Policy makers always feel more confident when they base their decisions on health policies using systematic literature reviews for they are unbiased unlike a situation where they would base their health policy decisions on individual reports that are full of subjectivity.
Furthermore, systematic literature reviews do not only offer conclusions for policy makers to base their decisions on, rather than they offer a whole evidence base for policy makers to evaluate the ways in which conclusions are drawn on a particular study and research question. This makes the quality of evidence used by policy makers to make their decisions not questionable. According to (Light, & Pillerner 1984), systematic literature reviews are useful for they provide a way through which researchers are able to summarize existing evidence in regard to a particular study or question.
Thousands of studies which are often published have contradictory information in regard to a particular study or question. Some of the published and unpublished studies may not even be in a language that is understood by all persons. If consumers’ gets information before it is included for systematic literature reviews, it becomes very confusing and contradictory to make out the information.
Systematic literature review is therefore important and necessary for summarizing the information available to the consumer and provides clearer results. Cooper (1984) argues that in the process of carefully analyzing, synthesizing and summarizing published and unpublished research evidence, gaps in research studies are carefully identified and this becomes the basis upon which systematic literature reviews establishes grounds in which future researches are founded.
Future research agendas are founded to fill the vacuums in research findings and to provide answers to research questions that have failed to be addressed by the existing published or unpublished researches. For instance, chemotherapy was primarily thought to be the only way through which cancer such as lung cancer could be treated until systematic literature reviews on four other newer types of drugs was done and the drugs were found to be effective in treating lung cancer.
According to a research published in the Wessex Institute Of Health Research and Development Journal, Paclitaxel, Docetaxel, Gemcitabine and Vinorelbine drugs were found not only to be an alternative for treating lung cancer but also affordable for patients suffering from lung cancer making it easier for more people to afford treatment. Therefore it is true to say that systematic literature review is the bridge between present research and future research.