Covid-19: Emerging themes from the systematic review records performed in the prospero

The pandemic caused by SARS-CoV-2, the etiological agent of COVID-19, is highly infectious and until April 29, 2021, in 223 Countries, areas, or territories with cases, 148,999,876 people contracted the disease. Due to the importance of the pandemic, the objective for this study was defined: to determine the proportion of records of systematic review in the PROSPERO about COVID-19 and to identify their themes in the global context. As a method, the “mapping review” was chosen about the protocols registered in the period from December 1, 2019, to January 14, 2021. We adopted as an eligibility criterion that, in the registered review protocol, COVID should be inserted in the title, in the question, and/or in the objective. Therefore, protocols that did not contemplate this requirement were not included in the present study. We found 2,397 protocols, with the following themes identified most frequently: pharmacological technologies (n = 521/21.7%); comorbidity x severity (n = 376/15.7%); signs and symptoms of COVID-19 (n = 261/10.9%) and laboratory diagnosis (n = 256/10.7%). Standing out less frequently: Signs and symptoms after COVID-19 (n = 37/1.5%); study relating MERS/SARS/EBOLA/HIV (n = 35/1.5%); Vaccine (n = 28/1.2%) and virus genome (n = 19/0.8%). The emerging themes associated with COVID-19 registered in PROSPERO in the systematic review protocols were diverse, demonstrating the various outlines of a pandemic and reaffirming the importance of this platform for scientific development.