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PRISMA 2020 flow templates

Updated Review — Reports Carried Forward

An update of an earlier review, which is the one place a PRISMA funnel may legitimately widen. Twenty-two reports of studies already included in the previous version enter at the included box without ever being sought this cycle — so `reports_included` exceeds `fulltext_assessed`, and the funnel-descent check would fire on a perfectly correct diagram unless the document could say why. `previous_reports` is how it says so, and the engine then checks the widened arithmetic rather than waiving it. Reports clean.

Template previewPRISMA 2020 flow
Statins for primary prevention — 2024 update914 records identified · 2 exclusion reasonsIdentificationScreeningEligibilityIncludedRecords identified from:n = 914Databases: 880 · Registers: 34Records removed before screeningn = 218Duplicates removed: 190Excluded by automation: 28Records screened (title / abstract)n = 696Records excluded by reviewern = 604Reports sought for retrievaln = 92Reports not retrievedn = 5Reports assessed for eligibilityn = 87Plus 22 reports carried forward from the previous versionReports excluded:n = 62Secondary prevention only: n = 38No cardiovascular endpoint: n = 24Studies included in reviewn = 39Reports of included studies: 47Every record is accounted for: all 4 stages of the flow balance.INFO47 reports describe 39 studies: 8 reports are a further paper about a study already counted.OKAll 12 stated counts are whole numbers of records.OKIdentification balances: 880 + 34 − 190 − 28 = 696 `title_screened`.OKScreening balances: 696 − 604 = 92 `abstracts_sought`.OKRetrieval balances: 92 − 5 = 87 `fulltext_assessed` (`other_sought` and `other_unavailable` are not stated and read as zero).OKEligibility balances: 109 − 62 = 47 `reports_included`.OKThe funnel descends: all 4 stage-to-stage comparisons hold — no count is larger than the one before it.OKAll 2 exclusion reasons are named and distinct, accounting for 62 reports.

Make it your own.

title "Statins for primary prevention — 2024 update"

db_records 880
register_records 34
duplicates 190
excluded_auto 28

title_screened 696
title_excluded 604

abstracts_sought 92
abstracts_unavailable 5

fulltext_assessed 87
previous_reports 22
exclude_reason "Secondary prevention only" 38
exclude_reason "No cardiovascular endpoint" 24

reports_included 47
studies_included 39