How to identify existing literature on patients' knowledge, views, and values: the development of a validated search filter

OBJECTIVE: The research sought to establish validated search filters for retrieval of studies on patients' knowledge and values. SETTING: Two nonprofit organizations in the Netherlands were studied for guideline development. METHODS: An existing filter was adapted to three bibliographic interfaces. After defining the scope, a reference database was built for the development of the new filters. The performance of the new filters was validated in different disease categories. RESULTS: Sensitivity, specificity, precision, negative predictive value, and accuracy were (%): 90.5/98/77/99.2/97 (MEDLINE-Ovid), 90.1/98.8/79.3/99.5/98.3 (PubMed), and 93.1/98.4/81.8/99.6/98.7 (Embase). CONCLUSIONS: The filters provide pragmatic tools for searching for patients' issues. Further optimization and validation is recommended.