Proposals for new reviews or updates

Proposals (expressions of interest)

Proposals are expressions of interest that can be submitted freely by any interested author. Proposals should be submitted by authors on the Central EM site. Proposals can no longer be submitted on other sites. 

If authors submit a proposal in your group's area of expertise, you may be invited by email to a Discussion on the Central EM site to assess the proposal. See Proposals from authors to conduct new Cochrane Reviews: process and guidance for Cochrane editors.

See also Instructions for authors on submitting a proposal.

If your group is continuing to initiate new reviews, you can respond to a Discussion on the Central EM site to indicate that your group will take forward a proposal. The submission Details (visible from the Discussion window) will provide full information about the proposed title and author team.

The Proposal Manager will also copy you in to the decision email to authors, to let them know you will take the proposal forward.  

You then have two options:

1. Invite the authors to submit a full review proposal form to provide further information about the proposed review. See Request a Title Proposal (full review proposal form)
2. Accept the proposal to create a new protocol and invite the authors to begin work. See Create a new protocol without a Proposal or Title Proposal from authors

Request a Title Proposal (full review proposal form) 

• From the Proposal Menu, Initiate Proposal.  Select Article Type Cochrane Title Proposal. 
• Proceed with no Schedule Group

• Pre-select Article Type and choose the Title Proposal for the correct review type (Intervention, Diagnostic Test Accuracy etc)

• Complete the Initiate Proposal form with review title and other relevant information
• Proceed and Build PDF and confirm your CRG name as the Section/Category
• View and Approve the Proposal
• Select the proposal in the New Proposals Requiring Assignment folder on the Manage Proposal Menu and Assign Editor
• Assign to yourself
• Select the proposal in the New Assignments - Proposals folder on the Manage Proposal Menu and Invite Authors
• On the Author Search screen, search for and select the corresponding author
• In the Author Candidates search results, select to Asn. (Assign) the Corresponding Author and Proceed
• On the Confirm Selection and Customize Letters screen, choose the correct assignment letter for the review type:
  • Author Invitation for Title Proposal (intervention reviews)
  • Author Invitation for Title Proposal non-intervention (non-intervention reviews)
  • Customize the letter if you wish 
• Re-enter the full title and tick to Lock title(s) for Author > Submit

Assess a Title Proposal

New Title Proposals will be visible in your Main menu under Direct to Editor New Submissions.

• From the Action Menu select Assign to myself 
• Confirm that the full author team is included in the submission Details. 
• Request declarations for interest from all authors. In the Details> select Initiate COI Disclosure Retrieval.
  
• From the Action Menu > Assign editorial task and select ME Check – Proposal
• Select the person to perform the check from the list. See Assign an editorial task 
• If you are completing the check, you will see the task in the Tasks tab on your main menu under Submission Tasks Assigned to Me
• Submit Task and complete the checklist of questions to assess the proposal's suitability. You do need to assess compliance with the Conflict of Interest policy and should not make an accept decision until all Conflict of Interest declarations are submitted by all authors (the authors are automatically requested to complete a declaration of interest upon submission of the full Title Proposal). 
• If you would like to seek other editors' opinions on the proposal, from the Action Menu > Discussions > Start new topic > Proposal Editor Review. 
• Your chosen editor(s) will be invited to the discussion. You will see responses under Submissions with Active Discussions in your main menu
• When you have the feedback you need, open the discussion from the Action Menu > Conclude Discussion
• From the Action Menu > Submit Editor’s Decision and Comments 
• You may choose to include the discussion comments in your message to the authors, to reinforce your decision:  Reject, Major Revision, Minor Revision or Accept
• Notifying the Author of an Accept decision will create the new protocol in Archie and RevMan.
• Solicit Commentary on the accepted Title Proposal to assign authors to begin work on the protocol.

If you ask the authors to revise the proposal further, it will return to you via Direct to Editor Revised Submissions in your main menu

Create a new protocol without a Proposal or Title Proposal from authors 

Proxy as the Corresponding Author and Submit New Manuscript. Add the title and contact details of all co-authors. Before doing this, you may wish to contact the Corresponding Author and co-authors, to let them know to expect some automated system notifications.

The submitted proposal will be visible in your Main menu under Direct to Editor New Submissions.

• Assign to Myself
• You do need to assess compliance with the Conflict of Interest policy and should not make an accept decision until the Conflict of Interest declarations are submitted by all authors. If not yet requested, then request declarations for interest from all authors. In the Details> select  Initiate COI Disclosure Retrieval.
  
• Submit Editor's Decision and Comments > Accept to create the protocol in Archie and RevMan.
• Submission moves to My Assignments with Decision folder. 
• Solicit Commentary on the accepted Proposal (expression of interest) to assign authors to begin work on the protocol.

New protocols in Archie and RevMan

Notifying the author of an Accept decision on a Proposal (expression of interest) or Title Proposal (full review proposal form) will create a new protocol in your Review Group's Resources menu in Archie, under Protocols - In Development - New. 

The new protocol will be in authoring phase in Archie and RevMan.

Protocol templates

If you have a template protocol listed in Archie, named according to the agreed naming convention, the template for the relevant review type will be selected automatically as the initial version of the protocol in RevMan.  

Initiate a review update

If authors contact you asking to begin work on an update, and you are happy for them to proceed, please Initiate Proposal to invite the update. You will also need to create a list in Convey to check author Declarations of Interest before they begin work.

If you have any queries about this, please contact Cochrane Support. 

Proposals to conduct a review update

Proposals to conduct review updates will also be accepted on the Central EM site from 24 June 2022. If authors submit a proposal to update one of your group's published reviews, you may be invited by email to a Discussion on the Central EM site to assess the proposal.

See also Instructions for authors on submitting a proposal.

If your group is continuing to initiate updates, you can respond to a Discussion on the Central EM site to indicate that your group will take this forward. If the author team complies with Cochrane's Conflict of Interest Policy, you will be notified by a further comment added to the Discussion by the Proposal Manager. The authors' Declarations of Interest will be available to download from the File Inventory in the Discussion window. The submission Details (also visible from the Discussion window) will provide full information about the author team.

The Proposal Manager will also copy you in to the decision email to authors, to let them know you will take the update forward.  

• Initiate Proposal to invite the update. 
• You do not need to assess compliance with the Conflict of Interest policy as this will have been done centrally at proposal stage. 
• Confirm the published review is in authoring phase in Archie, and the current author team can access the update in RevMan.