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Clarifying the abstracts of systematic literature reviews.

BACKGROUND
There is a small body of research on improving the clarity of abstracts in general that is relevant to improving the clarity of abstracts of systematic reviews.


OBJECTIVES
To summarize this earlier research and indicate its implications for writing the abstracts of systematic reviews.


METHOD
Literature review with commentary on three main features affecting the clarity of abstracts: their language, structure, and typographical presentation.


CONCLUSIONS
The abstracts of systematic reviews should be easier to read than the abstracts of medical research articles, as they are targeted at a wider audience. The aims, methods, results, and conclusions of systematic reviews need to be presented in a consistent way to help search and retrieval. The typographic detailing of the abstracts (type-sizes, spacing, and weights) should be planned to help, rather than confuse, the reader.