COVID-19 research tools

Hinweis: Weil die Ressourcen der Toolbox auf Englisch sind, haben wir auch die Einführungstexte auf Englisch verfasst.

The COVID-19 clinical research toolbox was created in the framework of the CEOsys project. It is a collection of tools designed to be helpful for your research on SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19. The search process for these tools was based on expert recommendations. The majority of tools linked in this toolbox were curated by experts on COVID-19 research. Some of the tools are also useful across more common research fields. We tried to list non-commercial tools wherever possible. There was no formal assessment of quality for these tools.

This is a living toolbox. We appreciate any feedback and input to keep it up to date. If you find a relevant tool to be added or require any further help with this collection please do not hesitate to contact us.

Please note, the CEOsys consortium is not maintaining these tools and is not responsible for their content, accuracy or quality.

COVID-19 clinical research tools sorted by study type

The following part of the toolbox supports research groups interested in conducting clinical trials on COVID-19. The tools are organized in categories depending on stages of a particular clinical trial research project.

This category focuses on tools to get an overview of research (literature, trials, data) available for your study topic.

  • Cochrane COVID-19 Study register
    The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is a freely-available, continually-updated, annotated reference collection of human primary studies on COVID-19. The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is „study-based,“ meaning references to the same study (e.g. press releases, trial registry records, preprints, journal pre-proofs, journal articles, retraction notices and expressions of concern) are all linked to a single study record.
    https://covid-19.cochrane.org/
  • LIVIVO COVID-19 collection
    Is a search portal for medicine, health, nutrition, and environmental and agricultural science. LIVIVO is an interdisciplinary search engine for literature and information in the field of life sciences.
    https://www.livivo.de/covid19

  • LitCovid
    LitCovid curated literature hub for tracking up-to-date scientific information. LitCovid searches relevant articles in PubMed. The articles are updated daily and are further categorized by different research topics and geographic locations for improved access.
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/research/coronavirus/

  • Global research on coronavirus disease (COVID-19)
    Global literature on coronavirus disease.
    https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/global-research-on-novel-coronavirus-2019-ncov

  • Camarades
    Camarades is an online systematic review platform. It is categorizing primary COVID-19 research studies with the help of a crowd of trained reviewers. Camarades visualizes the literature, interrogate the dataset and download relevant citations by the study characteristic of interest. Camarades tags primary research by research objectives, methodology, and the samples/subjects used.
    https://camarades.shinyapps.io/COVID-19-SOLES/

  • COVID19 evidence (Epistemonikos)
    Health systematic reviews are organized by L·OVEs (i.e. a topic, a condition or a problem) using the PICO format (Population, Intervention, Comparisons, and Outcomes)
    https://app.iloveevidence.com/loves/5e6fdb9669c00e4ac072701d?utm=ile

  • COVID-19: a living systematic map of the evidence
    Living map of the studies towards different topics: Treatment evaluation, Transmission / risk / prevalence, Diagnosis, Health impacts, Vaccine development, Treatment development, Genetics / biology, Case reports (patients), Case study – organization, Social / economic / indirect impacts, Mental health impacts
    http://eppi.ioe.ac.uk/cms/Projects/DepartmentofHealthandSocialCare/Publishedreviews/COVID-19Livingsystematicmapoftheevidence/tabid/3765/Default.aspx

  • COVID-19 Evidence Reviews
    It is cataloging COVID-19 evidence reviews and identifies new evidence reviews and reviews in progress. COVID-19 Rapid Review Sources: AHRQ; CADTH; COVID-19 and Mental Health Initiative; ECRI; COVID-19 Resource Center; Evidence Aid — Coronavirus (COVID-19): Evidence Collection; National COVID-19 Clinical Evidence Taskforce; NIPH Rapid Reviews; Cochrane COVID Rapid Reviews; COVID-END; etc.
    https://www.covid19reviews.org/

  • COVID-19 Data Portal
    The Data Portal brings together and continuously updates the relevant COVID-19 datasets and tools. The COVID-19 Data Portal enables researchers to upload, access and analyze COVID-19 related reference data and specialist datasets.
    https://www.covid19dataportal.org/
  • Trialstreamer
    Trialstreamer is an artificial intelligence system, which finds and summarizes new trial publications, registrations, and preprints in COVID-19. We monitor databases continuously.
    https://trialstreamer.robotreviewer.net/
  • transparimed
    Transparimed is a collection of hands-on tools and case studies that universities and other institution can use to improve their ​registration and reporting of clinical trials.
    https://www.transparimed.org/single-post/2020/03/27/COVID-19-clinical-trials-information-sources
  • COVID-NMA
    COVID-NMA is mapping and living systematic review of COVID-19 trials.
    https://covid-nma.com/
  • COVID19 Vaccine Tracker
    Tracks the progress of each of the COVID19 vaccine candidates including where they are being tested and where they have been approved. collate and curate COVID-19 vaccine clinical trial data from multiple sources.
    https://covid19.trackvaccines.org/
  • SARS-CoV-2 vaccine development trackerThe VaC tracker contains key features: 1. The ‘vaccine landscape’ includes a summary of SARS-CoV-2 vaccine candidates; 2. The ‘clinical trials database’ summarizes key attributes of all registered SARS-CoV-2 vaccine trials; 3. a ‘living review’ that distils the results of clinical trials as they become available; 4. Efficacy trial map: Map of planned and ongoing efficacy trials; 5. Implementation: Summary of vaccine distribution information.
    https://vac-lshtm.shinyapps.io/ncov_vaccine_landscape/
  • COVIDep
    COVIDep aims to provide real-time potential vaccine targets for SARS-CoV-2. It screens the SARS-derived B cell and T cell epitopes (available at VIPR / IEDB ) and identifies those which are highly conserved within the available SARS-CoV-2 sequences (continuing to be deposited at GISAID).
    https://covidep.ust.hk/
  • Zotero: COVID-19 vaccines results library
    Zotero is a free, easy-to-use tool to help you collect, organize, cite, and share research.
    https://www.zotero.org/groups/2528572/covid-19_vaccine_results/library
  • Covid-Evidence

    COVID-evidence is a continuously updated database of the worldwide available evidence on interventions for COVID-19 and provides information about worldwide planned, ongoing, and completed randomized controlled trials on any intervention to treat or prevent SARS-CoV-2-infections.
    https://covid-evidence.org/

This category focuses on relevant aspects when designing a clinical study on COVID-19.

  • National COVID-19 Clinical Evidence Taskforce
     LIVING GUIDELINES High-priority, evidence-based clinical COVID-19 guidelines. Topics: Living Guidelines, Clinical Flowcharts, Evidence Under Review. We have developed recommendations that cover: Definition of disease severity, Monitoring and markers of clinical deterioration, Disease-modifying treatments, Chemoprophylaxis, Respiratory support in adults, Respiratory support in neonates, children and adolescents, Venous thromboembolism (VTE) prophylaxis, Therapies for existing indications in patients with COVID-19, Timing of surgery following COVID-19 infection, Pregnancy and perinatal care.
    https://covid19evidence.net.au/#living-guidelines

  • ISARIC COVID-19 CCP Global Toolkit
    ISARIC has been committed to provide a wide breadth of COVID-19 clinical research resources for Case Report Forms. The tools below aim to cover a range of tiers, suitable for different needs: Data collection, Contributing clinical data, Research protocols, Guidance to start your study, ISARIC’s affiliated studies. This toolbox presents fully adaptable data collection solutions for different needs: COVID-19 Long term protocol & survey, COVID-19 Rapid Evidence Reviews Group (CORRE), COVID-19 Data Management & Hosting…
    https://isaric.org/research/covid-19-clinical-research-resources/covid-19-ccp-global/

  • COMET – Core outcome set developers’ response to COVID-19
    This briefing paper has been prepared and is maintained by COMET to summarize work to date on COS for COVID-19. The COMET team will try to respond to any queries you have about it. COMET will also facilitate contact with COS developers to help determine which COS may be most relevant to your particular research study.
    https://www.comet-initiative.org/Studies/Details/1538

  • COVID-19 Core Outcomes
    An international initiative to establish critically important core outcomes for trials in COVID-19. The COVID-19-COS project brings together patients, the public and health professionals to identify, prioritize and agree on the most important outcomes for research in COVID-19.
    https://www.covid-19-cos.org/

  • Core Outcomes Set for trials in people with Coronavirus Disease 2019
    The outcomes reported in trials in coronavirus disease 2019 are extremely heterogeneous and of uncertain patient relevance, limiting their applicability for clinical decision-making. The aim of this workshop was to establish a core outcomes set for trials in people with suspected or confirmed coronavirus disease 2019.
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7448717/pdf/ccm-48-01622.pdf

  • ISARIC Associated clinical studies in COVID-19
    ISARIC has many member networks, who are involved in patient-based research, to generate an evidence-based response to COVID 19, and has also provided support to several clinical trials, some of which are mentioned below.
    https://isaric.org/research/covid-19-clinical-research-resources/associated-clinical-studies-in-covid-19/

  • Medical Data Models
    MDM-Portal (Medical Data Models) is a meta-data registry for creating, analyzing, sharing and reusing medical forms. It serves as an infrastructure for academic (non-commercial) medical research to contribute a solution to this problem.
    https://medical-data-models.org/search?query=Covid-19

This category focuses on tools for (pre-)registration of studies.

  • ClinicalTrials.gov
    ClinicalTrials.gov is a database of privately and publicly funded clinical studies conducted around the world.
    www.clinicaltrials.gov

  • Cochrane COVID-19 Study register
    The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is a freely-available, continually-updated, annotated reference collection of human* primary studies on COVID-19. The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is „study-based,“ meaning references to the same study (e.g. press releases, trial registry records, preprints, journal pre-proofs, journal articles, retraction notices and expressions of concern) are all linked to a single study record.
    https://covid-19.cochrane.org/

  • EU Clinical Trials Register
    The European Union Clinical Trials Register allows you to search for protocol and results information on: interventional clinical trials that are conducted in the European Union (EU) and the European Economic Area (EEA); clinical trials conducted outside the EU / EEA that are linked to European paediatric-medicine development.
    https://www.clinicaltrialsregister.eu/ctr-search/search

  • Further primary registries in the WHO registry network
    Primary Registries in the WHO Registry Network meet specific criteria for content, quality and validity, accessibility, unique identification, technical capacity and administration.
    https://www.who.int/clinical-trials-registry-platform/network/primary-registries

This category provides data platforms to search for data as well as share your own data an guidelines for data-sharing.

  • COVID-19 Data Portal
    The Data Portal brings together and continuously updates the relevant COVID-19 datasets and tools. The COVID-19 Data Portal enables researchers to upload, access and analyse COVID-19 related reference data and specialist datasets.
    https://www.covid19dataportal.org/

  • Design guidelines for data analysis scripts
    Paper presenting guidelines that help keep analysis code well organized, easy to understand and convenient to work with: 1. Each analysis step is one script, 2. A script either processes a single recording, or aggregates across recordings, never both, 3. One master script to run the entire analysis, 4. Save all intermediate results, 5. Visualize all intermediate results, 6. Each parameter and filename is defined only once, 7. Distinguish files that are part of the official pipeline from other scripts.
    https://arxiv.org/pdf/1904.06163.pdf

This category focuses on several aspects of the publication process and beyond.

The following part of the toolbox specifically addresses non-interventional studies (e.g. epidemiology, etiology and prognosis). The tools are organized by stages in the life cycle of a research project.

This category focuses on tools to get an overview of research (literature, trials, data) available for your study topic.

  • Cochrane COVID-19 Study register
    The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is a freely-available, continually-updated, annotated reference collection of human primary studies on COVID-19. The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is „study-based,“ meaning references to the same study (e.g. press releases, trial registry records, preprints, journal pre-proofs, journal articles, retraction notices and expressions of concern) are all linked to a single study record.
    https://covid-19.cochrane.org/
  • LIVIVO COVID-19 collection
    Is a search portal for medicine, health, nutrition, and environmental and agricultural science. LIVIVO is an interdisciplinary search engine for literature and information in the field of life sciences.
    https://www.livivo.de/covid19

  • LitCovid
    LitCovid curated literature hub for tracking up-to-date scientific information. LitCovid searches relevant articles in PubMed. The articles are updated daily and are further categorized by different research topics and geographic locations for improved access.
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/research/coronavirus/

  • Camarades
    Camarades is an online systematic review platform. It is categorizing primary COVID-19 research studies with the help of a crowd of trained reviewers. Camarades visualizes the literature, interrogate the dataset and download relevant citations by the study characteristic of interest. Camarades tags primary research by research objectives, methodology, and the samples/subjects used.
    https://camarades.shinyapps.io/COVID-19-SOLES/

  • COVID19 evidence (Epistemonikos)
    Health systematic reviews are organized by L·OVEs (i.e. a topic, a condition or a problem) using the PICO format (Population, Intervention, Comparisons, and Outcomes)
    https://app.iloveevidence.com/loves/5e6fdb9669c00e4ac072701d?utm=ile

  • COVID-19: a living systematic map of the evidence
    Living map of the studies towards different topics: Treatment evaluation, Transmission / risk / prevalence, Diagnosis, Health impacts, Vaccine development, Treatment development, Genetics / biology, Case reports (patients), Case study – organization, Social / economic / indirect impacts, Mental health impacts
    http://eppi.ioe.ac.uk/cms/Projects/DepartmentofHealthandSocialCare/Publishedreviews/COVID-19Livingsystematicmapoftheevidence/tabid/3765/Default.aspx

  • COVID-19 Evidence Reviews
    It is cataloging COVID-19 evidence reviews and identifies new evidence reviews and reviews in progress. COVID-19 Rapid Review Sources: AHRQ; CADTH; COVID-19 and Mental Health Initiative; ECRI; COVID-19 Resource Center; Evidence Aid — Coronavirus (COVID-19): Evidence Collection; National COVID-19 Clinical Evidence Taskforce; NIPH Rapid Reviews; Cochrane COVID Rapid Reviews; COVID-END; etc.
    https://www.covid19reviews.org/

  • Global research on coronavirus disease (COVID-19)
    Global research database. The WHO is gathering the latest international multilingual scientific findings and knowledge on COVID-19. This database represents a comprehensive multilingual source of current literature on the topic. While it may not be exhaustive, new research is added regularly.
    https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/global-research-on-novel-coronavirus-2019-ncov

  • OxCOVID19 Database
    OxCOVID19 Database is a large, single-centre, multimodal relational database consisting of information related to COVID-19 pandemic. OxCOVID19 Database is currenlty comprised of six tables: EPIDEMIOLOGY, GOVERNMENT_RESPONSE, COUNTRY_STATISTICS, MOBILITY, WEATHER and ADMINISTRATIVE_DIVISION.
    https://covid19.eng.ox.ac.uk/database.html

  • GECCO – German Corona Consensus – Covid-19 Research-Dataset
    GECCO is a consensus data set which systematically collect and pools data of treated COVID-19 patients within the Netzwerk Universitätsmedizin (Network of medical universities). GECCO aims at providing the science around COVID-19 with a common language and working basis.
    https://art-decor.org/art-decor/decor-datasets–covid19f- auch hier zu finden: https://medical-data-models.org/41490

  • COVID-19 Data Portal
    The Data Portal brings together and continuously updates the relevant COVID-19 datasets and tools. The COVID-19 Data Portal enables researchers to upload, access and analyze COVID-19 related reference data and specialist datasets.
    https://www.covid19dataportal.org/

  • EU Clinical Trials Register
    The European Union Clinical Trials Register allows you to search for protocol and results information on: interventional clinical trials that are conducted in the European Union (EU) and the European Economic Area (EEA); clinical trials conducted outside the EU / EEA that are linked to European paediatric-medicine development.
    https://www.clinicaltrialsregister.eu/ctr-search/search

  • Further primary registries in the WHO registry network
    Primary Registries in the WHO Registry Network meet specific criteria for content, quality and validity, accessibility, unique identification, technical capacity and administration.
    https://www.who.int/clinical-trials-registry-platform/network/primary-registries

This category focuses on relevant aspects when designing a clinical study on COVID-19.

  • PANGO lineages
    PANGO presents a rational and dynamic virus nomenclature that uses a phylogenetic framework to identify those lineages that contribute most to active spread. It assists genomic epidemiology.
    https://cov-lineages.org/index.html

  • Medical Data Models
    MDM-Portal (Medical Data Models) is a meta-data registry for creating, analyzing, sharing and reusing medical forms. It serves as an infrastructure for academic (non-commercial) medical research to contribute a solution to this problem.
    https://medical-data-models.org/search?query=Covid-19

  • PCFS
    This tool provides an ordinal scale assessing the full range of functional limitations to capture the heterogeneity of post-COVID-19 outcome.
    https://osf.io/qgpdv/

This category focuses on tools for (pre-)registration of studies.

  • ClinicalTrials.gov
    ClinicalTrials.gov is a database of privately and publicly funded clinical studies conducted around the world.
    www.clinicaltrials.gov

  • Cochrane COVID-19 Study register
    The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is a freely-available, continually-updated, annotated reference collection of human* primary studies on COVID-19. The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is „study-based,“ meaning references to the same study (e.g. press releases, trial registry records, preprints, journal pre-proofs, journal articles, retraction notices and expressions of concern) are all linked to a single study record.
    https://covid-19.cochrane.org/

  • EU Clinical Trials Register
    The European Union Clinical Trials Register allows you to search for protocol and results information on: interventional clinical trials that are conducted in the European Union (EU) and the European Economic Area (EEA); clinical trials conducted outside the EU / EEA that are linked to European paediatric-medicine development.
    https://www.clinicaltrialsregister.eu/ctr-search/search

  • Further primary registries in the WHO registry network
    Primary Registries in the WHO Registry Network meet specific criteria for content, quality and validity, accessibility, unique identification, technical capacity and administration.
    https://www.who.int/clinical-trials-registry-platform/network/primary-registries

This category provides data platforms to search for data as well as share your own data an guidelines for data-sharing.

  • OxCOVID19 Database
    OxCOVID19 Database is a large, single-centre, multimodal relational database consisting of information related to COVID-19 pandemic. OxCOVID19 Database is currently comprised of six tables: Epidemiology, Government_Response, Country_Statistics, Mobility, Weather And Administrative_Division.
    https://covid19.eng.ox.ac.uk/

  • GECCO – German Corona Consensus – Covid-19 Research-Dataset
    GECCO is a consensus data set which systematically collect and pools data of treated COVID-19 patients within the Netzwerk Universitätsmedizin (Network of medical universities Germany). GECCO aims at providing the science around COVID-19 with a common language and working basis.
    https://art-decor.org/art-decor/decor-datasets–covid19f- auch hier zu finden: https://medical-data-models.org/41490

  • COVID-19 Data Portal
    The Data Portal brings together and continuously updates the relevant COVID-19 datasets and tools. The COVID-19 Data Portal enables researchers to upload, access and analyse COVID-19 related reference data and specialist datasets.
    https://www.covid19dataportal.org/

  • MiTepid_sim
    A Repository to Simulate the Spread of COVID-19 in any Population with a Known Age-Structure. The library can also be used to study the effects of vaccination in a population.
    https://github.com/vahid-sb/MiTepid_sim

  • COVID-19 Analysis Portal
    Provides an advanced human mobility model, and attach virus infection dynamics taken from recent literature and publications. This results in a virus spreading dynamics model.
    https://covid-sim.info/

  • Design guidelines for data analysis scripts
    Paper presenting guidelines that help keep analysis code well organized, easy to understand and convenient to work with: 1. Each analysis step is one script, 2. A script either processes a single recording, or aggregates across recordings, never both, 3. One master script to run the entire analysis, 4. Save all intermediate results, 5. Visualize all intermediate results, 6. Each parameter and filename is defined only once, 7. Distinguish files that are part of the official pipeline from other scripts.
    https://arxiv.org/pdf/1904.06163.pdf

This category focuses on several aspects of the publication process and beyond.

The following part of the toolbox is intended to support research groups who are interested in health services research. This part focuses on implementation of clinical and observational research results on an organizational level. Most of the tools described go beyond specific COVID-19 research.

This category focuses on tools to get an overview of research (literature, trials, data) available for your study topic.

  • Cochrane COVID-19 Study register
    The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is a freely-available, continually-updated, annotated reference collection of human primary studies on COVID-19. The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is „study-based,“ meaning references to the same study (e.g. press releases, trial registry records, preprints, journal pre-proofs, journal articles, retraction notices and expressions of concern) are all linked to a single study record.
    https://covid-19.cochrane.org/

  • LitCovid
    LitCovid curated literature hub for tracking up-to-date scientific information. LitCovid searches relevant articles in PubMed. The articles are updated daily and are further categorized by different research topics and geographic locations for improved access.
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/research/coronavirus/

  • COVID19 evidence (Epistemonikos)
    Health systematic reviews are organized by L·OVEs (i.e. a topic, a condition or a problem) using the PICO format (Population, Intervention, Comparisons, and Outcomes)
    https://app.iloveevidence.com/loves/5e6fdb9669c00e4ac072701d?utm=ile

  • COVID-19 Evidence Reviews
    It is cataloging COVID-19 evidence reviews and identifies new evidence reviews and reviews in progress. COVID-19 Rapid Review Sources: AHRQ; CADTH; COVID-19 and Mental Health Initiative; ECRI; COVID-19 Resource Center; Evidence Aid — Coronavirus (COVID-19): Evidence Collection; National COVID-19 Clinical Evidence Taskforce; NIPH Rapid Reviews; Cochrane COVID Rapid Reviews; COVID-END; etc.
    https://www.covid19reviews.org/

  • Trialstreamer
    Trialstreamer is an artificial intelligence system, which finds and summarizes new trial publications, registrations, and preprints in COVID-19. We monitor databases continuously.
    https://trialstreamer.robotreviewer.net/

  • Kompetenznetz Public Health COVID-19
    https://www.public-health-covid19.de

  • BESSI
    Suppression of pandemics and epidemics cannot rely solely on waiting for effective vaccines and/or medical treatment: we need plans to use, improve & evaluate effective behavioural, environmental, social and systems interventions (BESSI) to reduce viral transmission. Research protocols are presented.
    https://www.bessi-collab.net/research

The following tools support the design of interventions directed to organizational change / implementation of evidence-based measures.

This category focuses on tools for (pre-)registration of studies.

  • ClinicalTrials.gov
    ClinicalTrials.gov is a database of privately and publicly funded clinical studies conducted around the world.
    www.clinicaltrials.gov

  • Cochrane COVID-19 Study register
    The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is a freely-available, continually-updated, annotated reference collection of human* primary studies on COVID-19. The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is „study-based,“ meaning references to the same study (e.g. press releases, trial registry records, preprints, journal pre-proofs, journal articles, retraction notices and expressions of concern) are all linked to a single study record.
    https://covid-19.cochrane.org/

  • EU Clinical Trials Register
    The European Union Clinical Trials Register allows you to search for protocol and results information on: interventional clinical trials that are conducted in the European Union (EU) and the European Economic Area (EEA); clinical trials conducted outside the EU / EEA that are linked to European paediatric-medicine development.
    https://www.clinicaltrialsregister.eu/ctr-search/search

  • Further primary registries in the WHO registry network
    Primary Registries in the WHO Registry Network meet specific criteria for content, quality and validity, accessibility, unique identification, technical capacity and administration.
    https://www.who.int/clinical-trials-registry-platform/network/primary-registries

Data registries for input of patient data.

  • LEOSS
    LEOSS: Lean European Open Survey on SARS-CoV-2 Infected Patients. The LEOSS public data set constitutes patient data from the LEOSS cohort after a data cleaning process.
    https://leoss.net/

Note: There are many registries to be found worldwide Most registries focus on specific patient groups or entities. A separate specific search might be warranted.

This publication by the AHRQ provides a Users Guide to develop Registries for Evaluating Patient Outcomes
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK208631/

To check, if interventions have been tested before health technology assessments (HTA) might be useful. Although not COVID-specific, there are resources that provide an overview over complex interventions and their success. For long-term evaluation of implementation success, it might be useful to develop quality indicators.

This category focuses on several aspects of the publication process and beyond.

COVID-19 clinical research tools sorted by study type
The following part of the toolbox supports research groups interested in conducting clinical trials on COVID-19. The tools are organized in categories depending on stages of a particular clinical trial research project.
Preparation

This category focuses on tools to get an overview of research (literature, trials, data) available for your study topic.

You are looking for literature related to COVID-19 research?

Try these systematic review tools.

Cochrane COVID-19 Study register

The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is a freely-available, continually-updated, annotated reference collection of human primary studies on COVID-19. The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is „study-based,“ meaning references to the same study (e.g. press releases, trial registry records, preprints, journal pre-proofs, journal articles, retraction notices and expressions of concern) are all linked to a single study record.

https://covid-19.cochrane.org/

LIVIVO COVID-19 collection

Is a search portal for medicine, health, nutrition, and environmental and agricultural science. LIVIVO is an interdisciplinary search engine for literature and information in the field of life sciences.

https://www.livivo.de/covid19

LitCovid

LitCovid curated literature hub for tracking up-to-date scientific information. LitCovid searches relevant articles in PubMed. The articles are updated daily and are further categorized by different research topics and geographic locations for improved access.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/research/coronavirus/

Global research on coronavirus disease (COVID-19)

Global literature on coronavirus disease.

https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/global-research-on-novel-coronavirus-2019-ncov

Camarades

Camarades is an online systematic review platform. It is categorizing primary COVID-19 research studies with the help of a crowd of trained reviewers. Camarades visualizes the literature, interrogate the dataset and download relevant citations by the study characteristic of interest. Camarades tags primary research by research objectives, methodology, and the samples/subjects used.

https://camarades.shinyapps.io/COVID-19-SOLES/

COVID19 evidence (Epistemonikos)

Health systematic reviews are organized by L·OVEs (i.e. a topic, a condition or a problem) using the PICO format (Population, Intervention, Comparisons, and Outcomes)

https://app.iloveevidence.com/loves/5e6fdb9669c00e4ac072701d?utm=ile

COVID-19: a living systematic map of the evidence

Living map of the studies towards different topics: Treatment evaluation, Transmission / risk / prevalence, Diagnosis, Health impacts, Vaccine development, Treatment development, Genetics / biology, Case reports (patients), Case study – organization, Social / economic / indirect impacts, Mental health impacts

http://eppi.ioe.ac.uk/cms/Projects/DepartmentofHealthandSocialCare/Publishedreviews/COVID-19Livingsystematicmapoftheevidence/tabid/3765/Default.aspx

COVID-19 Evidence Reviews

It is cataloging COVID-19 evidence reviews and identifies new evidence reviews and reviews in progress. COVID-19 Rapid Review Sources: AHRQ; CADTH; COVID-19 and Mental Health Initiative; ECRI; COVID-19 Resource Center; Evidence Aid — Coronavirus (COVID-19): Evidence Collection; National COVID-19 Clinical Evidence Taskforce; NIPH Rapid Reviews; Cochrane COVID Rapid Reviews; COVID-END; etc.

https://www.covid19reviews.org/

You are looking for data on COVID-19 research?

These data-platforms are used to share research data on SARS-Cov2 and COVID-19.

COVID-19 Data Portal

The Data Portal brings together and continuously updates the relevant COVID-19 datasets and tools. The COVID-19 Data Portal enables researchers to upload, access and analyze COVID-19 related reference data and specialist datasets.

https://www.covid19dataportal.org/

You are looking for trials and research related to COVID-19?

The trial trackers, and research monitoring tools can help.

Trialstreamer:

Trialstreamer is an artificial intelligence system, which finds and summarizes new trial publications, registrations, and preprints in COVID-19. We monitor databases continuously

https://trialstreamer.robotreviewer.net/

transparimed:

Transparimed is a collection of hands-on tools and case studies that universities and other institution can use to improve their ​registration and reporting of clinical trials.

https://www.transparimed.org/single-post/2020/03/27/COVID-19-clinical-trials-information-sources

COVID-NMA:

COVID-NMA is mapping and living systematic review of COVID-19 trials.

https://covid-nma.com/

COVID19 Vaccine Tracker

Tracks the progress of each of the COVID19 vaccine candidates including where they are being tested and where they have been approved. collate and curate COVID-19 vaccine clinical trial data from multiple sources

https://covid19.trackvaccines.org/

SARS-CoV-2 vaccine development tracker

The VaC tracker contains key features: 1. The ‘vaccine landscape’ includes a summary of SARS-CoV-2 vaccine candidates; 2. The ‘clinical trials database’ summarizes key attributes of all registered SARS-CoV-2 vaccine trials; 3. a ‘living review’ that distils the results of clinical trials as they become available; 4. Efficacy trial map: Map of planned and ongoing efficacy trials; 5. Implementation: Summary of vaccine distribution information.

https://vac-lshtm.shinyapps.io/ncov_vaccine_landscape/

COVIDep

COVIDep aims to provide real-time potential vaccine targets for SARS-CoV-2. It screens the SARS-derived B cell and T cell epitopes (available at VIPR / IEDB ) and identifies those which are highly conserved within the available SARS-CoV-2 sequences (continuing to be deposited at GISAID ).

https://covidep.ust.hk/

Zotero: COVID-19 vaccines results library

Zotero is a free, easy-to-use tool to help you collect, organize, cite, and share research.

https://www.zotero.org/groups/2528572/covid-19_vaccine_results/library

Study design

This category focuses on relevant aspects when designing a clinical study on COVID-19.

You are looking for tools helping to design your study?

These links provide guidelines for designing COVID-19 studies.

National COVID-19 Clinical Evidence Taskforce: LIVING GUIDELINES High-priority, evidence-based clinical COVID-19 guidelines. Topics: Living Guidelines, Clinical Flowcharts, Evidence Under Review. We have developed recommendations that cover: Definition of disease severity, Monitoring and markers of clinical deterioration, Disease-modifying treatments, Chemoprophylaxis, Respiratory support in adults, Respiratory support in neonates, children and adolescents, Venous thromboembolism (VTE) prophylaxis, Therapies for existing indications in patients with COVID-19, Timing of surgery following COVID-19 infection, Pregnancy and perinatal care

https://covid19evidence.net.au/#living-guidelines

ISARIC COVID-19 CCP Global Toolkit

ISARIC has been committed to provide a wide breadth of COVID-19 clinical research resources for Case Report Forms. The tools below aim to cover a range of tiers, suitable for different needs: Data collection, Contributing clinical data, Research protocols, Guidance to start your study, ISARIC’s affiliated studies. This toolbox presents fully adaptable data collection solutions for different needs: COVID-19 Long term protocol & survey, COVID-19 Rapid Evidence Reviews Group (CORRE), COVID-19 Data Management & Hosting…

https://isaric.org/research/covid-19-clinical-research-resources/covid-19-ccp-global/

You want to have comparable outcomes?

Here are some outcome sets, scales and templates.

COMET – Core outcome set developers’ response to COVID-19

This briefing paper has been prepared and is maintained by COMET to summarize work to date on COS for COVID-19. The COMET team will try to respond to any queries you have about it. COMET will also facilitate contact with COS developers to help determine which COS may be most relevant to your particular research study.

https://www.comet-initiative.org/Studies/Details/1538

COVID-19 Core Outcomes

An international initiative to establish critically important core outcomes for trials in COVID-19. The COVID-19-COS project brings together patients, the public and health professionals to identify, prioritize and agree on the most important outcomes for research in COVID-19.

https://www.covid-19-cos.org/

Core Outcomes Set for trials in people with Coronavirus Disease 2019. The outcomes reported in trials in coronavirus disease 2019 are extremely heterogeneous and of uncertain patient relevance, limiting their applicability for clinical decision-making. The aim of this workshop was to establish a core outcomes set for trials in people with suspected or confirmed coronavirus disease 2019.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7448717/pdf/ccm-48-01622.pdf

ISARIC Associated clinical studies in COVID-19

ISARIC has many member networks, who are involved in patient-based research, to generate an evidence-based response to COVID 19, and has also provided support to several clinical trials, some of which are mentioned below.

https://isaric.org/research/covid-19-clinical-research-resources/associated-clinical-studies-in-covid-19/

Medical Data Models

MDM-Portal (Medical Data Models) is a meta-data registry for creating, analyzing, sharing and reusing medical forms. It serves as an infrastructure for academic (non-commercial) medical research to contribute a solution to this problem.

https://medical-data-models.org/search?query=Covid-19

You are looking for tools to prepare a protocol?

These protocol development tools allow rapid, effective protocol development during the COVID-19 Pandemic.

R&D Good Participatory Practice for COVID-19 clinical trials. A toolbox

https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/r-d-good-participatory-practice-for-covid-19-clinical-trials-a-toolbox

Protocol Development toolkit.

This Protocol Development Toolkit aims to support researchers in the protocol development process, by providing the tools and guidance to produce a high-quality health research Protocol. Concept Protocol: A Mixed-Methods Platform Trial for Assessing Public Health Interventions During the COVID-19 Pandemic

https://coronavirus.tghn.org/covid-therapeutic-trials/protocol-development/

The Unity Studies: WHO Early Investigations Protocols

https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/technical-guidance/early-investigations

ISARIC – COVID-19 clinical research resources: protocols

ISARIC has been committed to provide a wide breadth of COVID-19 clinical research resources for Case Report Forms. The tools below aim to cover a range of tiers, suitable for different needs: Research protocols, COVID-19 Long term protocol & survey or COVID-19 follow-up protocol

https://isaric.org/research/covid-19-clinical-research-resources/clinical-characterisation-protocol-ccp/ https://isaric.org/research/covid-19-clinical-research-resources/covid-19-long-term-follow-up-study/ https://isaric.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/ISARIC-Covid-19-follow-up-protocol.pdf

Registration

This category focuses on tools for (pre-)registration of studies.

You want to (pre-)register your study?

Here are a few links to registration platforms.

ClinicalTrials.gov is a database of privately and publicly funded clinical studies conducted around the world.

www.clinicaltrials.gov

Cochrane COVID-19 Study register

The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is a freely-available, continually-updated, annotated reference collection of human* primary studies on COVID-19. The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is „study-based,“ meaning references to the same study (e.g. press releases, trial registry records, preprints, journal pre-proofs, journal articles, retraction notices and expressions of concern) are all linked to a single study record.

https://covid-19.cochrane.org/

EU Clinical Trials Register

The European Union Clinical Trials Register allows you to search for protocol and results information on: interventional clinical trials that are conducted in the European Union (EU) and the European Economic Area (EEA); clinical trials conducted outside the EU / EEA that are linked to European paediatric-medicine development.

https://www.clinicaltrialsregister.eu/ctr-search/search

Further primary registries in the WHO registry network

Primary Registries in the WHO Registry Network meet specific criteria for content, quality and validity, accessibility, unique identification, technical capacity and administration.

https://www.who.int/clinical-trials-registry-platform/network/primary-registries

Data

This category provides data platforms to search for data as well as share your own data an guidelines for data-sharing.

You are looking for data platforms or want to contribute your own study-data?

Here are a few data platforms.

COVID-19 Data Portal

The Data Portal brings together and continuously updates the relevant COVID-19 datasets and tools. The COVID-19 Data Portal enables researchers to upload, access and analyse COVID-19 related reference data and specialist datasets.

https://www.covid19dataportal.org/

You are looking for a guideline how to contribute your own data on COVID-19?

These guidelines for data-sharing can help.

GECCO – German Corona Consensus – Covid-19 Research-Dataset

GECCO is a consensus data set which systematically collect and pools data of treated COVID-19 patients within the Netzwerk Universitätsmedizin (Network of medical universities Germany). GECCO aims at providing the science around COVID-19 with a common language and working basis.

https://art-decor.org/art-decor/decor-datasets–covid19f- auch hier zu finden: https://medical-data-models.org/41490

Zenodo – This is the final version of the Recommendations and Guidelines from the RDA COVID-19 Working Group has been endorsed through the official RDA process.

https://zenodo.org/record/3932953#.YI_DTe1xdPa

You want to make your analysis script available?

Here is a guideline to design data analysis scripts

Design guidelines for data analysis scripts

Paper presenting guidelines that help keep analysis code well organized, easy to understand and convenient to work with: 1. Each analysis step is one script, 2. A script either processes a single recording, or aggregates across recordings, never both, 3. One master script to run the entire analysis, 4. Save all intermediate results, 5. Visualize all intermediate results, 6. Each parameter and filename is defined only once, 7. Distinguish files that are part of the official pipeline from other scripts

https://arxiv.org/pdf/1904.06163.pdf

Publication and beyond

This category focuses on several aspects of the publication process and beyond.

You want to publish your work?

These tools can help to search for journals.

Sherpa Romeo is an online resource that aggregates and presents publisher and journal open access policies from around the world.

https://v2.sherpa.ac.uk/romeo/search.html

You want to make sure that your research will be recognized?

These tools help to increase recognition of your research.

ELSEVIER Author services manuscript preparation

How to Select the Best Keywords for a Manuscript

https://scientific-publishing.webshop.elsevier.com/manuscript-preparation/how-choose-keywords-manuscript/

Medical Subject Headings

Suggestions for Finding Author Keywords using MeSH Tools

https://www.nlm.nih.gov/mesh/authors.html

Ten simple rules for getting started on Twitter as a scientist

https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1007513

The following part of the toolbox specifically addresses non-interventional studies (e.g. epidemiology, etiology and prognosis). The tools are organized by stages in the life cycle of a research project.
Preparation

This category focuses on providing tools to get an overview of research (literature, trials, data) available about your topic of study.

You are looking for literature and systematic review tools?

Here we compiled a number of systematic review tools.

Cochrane COVID-19 Study register

The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is a freely-available, continually-updated, annotated reference collection of human* primary studies on COVID-19. The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is „study-based,“ meaning references to the same study (e.g. press releases, trial registry records, preprints, journal pre-proofs, journal articles, retraction notices and expressions of concern) are all linked to a single study record.

https://covid-19.cochrane.org/

LIVIVO COVID-19 collection

Is a search portal for medicine, health, nutrition, and environmental and agricultural sciences. LIVIVO is an interdisciplinary search engine for literature and information in the field of life sciences.

https://www.livivo.de/covid19

LitCovid

LitCovid curated literature hub for tracking up-to-date scientific information. LitCovid searches relevant articles in PubMed. The articles are updated daily and are further categorized by different research topics and geographic locations for improved access.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/research/coronavirus/

Camarades

Camarades is an online systematic review platform. It is categorizing primary COVID-19 research studies with the help of a crowd of trained reviewers. Camarades visualizes the literature, interrogate the dataset and download relevant citations by the study characteristic of interest. Camarades tags primary research by research objectives, methodology, and the samples/subjects used.

https://camarades.shinyapps.io/COVID-19-SOLES/

COVID19 evidence (Epistemonikos)

Health systematic reviews are organized by L·OVEs (i.e. a topic, a condition or a problem) using the PICO format (Population, Intervention, Comparisons, and Outcomes)

https://app.iloveevidence.com/loves/5e6fdb9669c00e4ac072701d?utm=ile

COVID-19: a living systematic map of the evidence

Living map of the studies towards different topics: Treatment evaluation, Transmission / risk / prevalence, Diagnosis, Health impacts, Vaccine development, Treatment development, Genetics / biology, Case reports (patients), Case study – organization, Social / economic / indirect impacts, Mental health impacts

http://eppi.ioe.ac.uk/cms/Projects/DepartmentofHealthandSocialCare/Publishedreviews/COVID-19Livingsystematicmapoftheevidence/tabid/3765/Default.aspx

COVID-19 Evidence Reviews

It is cataloging COVID-19 evidence reviews and identifies new evidence reviews and reviews in progress. COVID-19 Rapid Review Sources: AHRQ; CADTH; COVID-19 and Mental Health Initiative; ECRI;COVID-19 Resource Center; Evidence Aid — Coronavirus (COVID-19): Evidence Collection; National COVID-19 Clinical Evidence Taskforce; NIPH Rapid Reviews; Cochrane COVID Rapid Reviews; COVID-END; etc.

https://www.covid19reviews.org/

Global research on coronavirus disease (COVID-19)

Global research database. The WHO is gathering the latest international multilingual scientific findings and knowledge on COVID-19. This database represents a comprehensive multilingual source of current literature on the topic. While it may not be exhaustive, new research is added regularly.

https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/global-research-on-novel-coronavirus-2019-ncov

You are looking for data on COVID-19 research?

Here is a collection of data-platforms.

OxCOVID19 Database

OxCOVID19 Database is a large, single-centre, multimodal relational database consisting of information related to COVID-19 pandemic. OxCOVID19 Database is currenlty comprised of six tables: EPIDEMIOLOGY, GOVERNMENT_RESPONSE, COUNTRY_STATISTICS, MOBILITY, WEATHER and ADMINISTRATIVE_DIVISION.

https://covid19.eng.ox.ac.uk/database.html

GECCO – German Corona Consensus – Covid-19 Research-Dataset

GECCO is a consensus data set which systematically collect and pools data of treated COVID-19 patients within the Netzwerk Universitätsmedizin (Network of medical universities). GECCO aims at providing the science around COVID-19 with a common language and working basis.

https://art-decor.org/art-decor/decor-datasets–covid19f- auch hier zu finden: https://medical-data-models.org/41490

COVID-19 Data Portal

The Data Portal brings together and continuously updates the relevant COVID-19 datasets and tools. The COVID-19 Data Portal enables researchers to upload, access and analyse COVID-19 related reference data and specialist datasets.

https://www.covid19dataportal.org/

You are looking for trials and research related to COVID-19?

These trial trackers and research monitoring tools can help.

EU Clinical Trials Register

The European Union Clinical Trials Register allows you to search for protocol and results information on: interventional clinical trials that are conducted in the European Union (EU) and the European Economic Area (EEA); clinical trials conducted outside the EU / EEA that are linked to European paediatric-medicine development.

https://www.clinicaltrialsregister.eu/ctr-search/search

Further primary registries in the WHO registry network

Primary Registries in the WHO Registry Network meet specific criteria for content, quality and validity, accessibility, unique identification, technical capacity and administration.

https://www.who.int/clinical-trials-registry-platform/network/primary-registries

Study design

This category focuses on relevant aspects when designing a non-interventional study on COVID-19.

You are looking for tools helping to design your study?

Here we provide links to tools giving guidance in designing COVID-19 studies.

Virus Bioinformatics Tools

This is a collection of useful tools in Virus Bioinformatics curated by the European Virus Bioinformatics Center. Please note, that the EVBC is not maintaining the tools.

https://www.notion.so/18e21bc49827484b8a2f84463cb40b8d?v=e7d7a105cc8d4a8d85147013cb43ca91

You want comparable outcome? – Outcome sets, scales, nomenclature

Here are links to outcome sets, scales, templates and nomenclatures.

PANGO lineages

PANGO presents a rational and dynamic virus nomenclature that uses a phylogenetic framework to identify those lineages that contribute most to active spread. It assists genomic epidemiology.

https://cov-lineages.org/index.html

Medical Data Models

MDM-Portal (Medical Data Models) is a meta-data registry for creating, analyzing, sharing and reusing medical forms. It serves as an infrastructure for academic (non-commercial) medical research to contribute a solution to this problem.

https://medical-data-models.org/search?query=Covid-19

PCFS

This tool provides an ordinal scale assessing the full range of functional limitations to capture the heterogeneity of post-COVID-19 outcome.

https://osf.io/qgpdv/

You are looking for tools to prepare a protocol?

These protocol development tools allow rapid, effective protocol development during the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Protocol Development toolkit.

This Protocol Development Toolkit aims to support researchers in the protocol development process, by providing the tools and guidance to produce a high-quality health research Protocol. Concept Protocol: A Mixed-Methods Platform Trial for Assessing Public Health Interventions During the COVID-19 Pandemic

https://coronavirus.tghn.org/covid-therapeutic-trials/protocol-development/

The Unity Studies: WHO Early Investigations Protocols

https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/technical-guidance/early-investigations

Registration

This category focuses on tools for (pre-)registration of studies.

You want to (pre-)register your study?

Here are links to registration platforms.

ClinicalTrials.gov is a database of privately and publicly funded clinical studies conducted around the world.

www.clinicaltrials.gov

Cochrane COVID-19 Study register

The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is a freely-available, continually-updated, annotated reference collection of human* primary studies on COVID-19. The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is „study-based,“ meaning references to the same study (e.g. press releases, trial registry records, preprints, journal pre-proofs, journal articles, retraction notices and expressions of concern) are all linked to a single study record.

https://covid-19.cochrane.org/

EU Clinical Trials Register

The European Union Clinical Trials Register allows you to search for protocol and results information on: interventional clinical trials that are conducted in the European Union (EU) and the European Economic Area (EEA); clinical trials conducted outside the EU / EEA that are linked to European paediatric-medicine development.

https://www.clinicaltrialsregister.eu/ctr-search/search

Further primary registries in the WHO registry network

Primary Registries in the WHO Registry Network meet specific criteria for content, quality and validity, accessibility, unique identification, technical capacity and administration.

https://www.who.int/clinical-trials-registry-platform/network/primary-registries

Data and modelling

This category provides data platforms to search for data as well as share your own data, guidelines for data-sharing and models for simulation on COVID-19 development and epidemiological effects.

You are looking for data or want to contribute your own study-data?

Here are a few data platforms.

OxCOVID19 Database

OxCOVID19 Database is a large, single-centre, multimodal relational database consisting of information related to COVID-19 pandemic. OxCOVID19 Database is currently comprised of six tables: Epidemiology, Government_Response, Country_Statistics, Mobility, Weather And Administrative_Division.

https://covid19.eng.ox.ac.uk/

GECCO – German Corona Consensus – Covid-19 Research-Dataset

GECCO is a consensus data set which systematically collect and pools data of treated COVID-19 patients within the Netzwerk Universitätsmedizin (Network of medical universities Germany). GECCO aims at providing the science around COVID-19 with a common language and working basis.

https://art-decor.org/art-decor/decor-datasets–covid19f- auch hier zu finden: https://medical-data-models.org/41490

COVID-19 Data Portal

The Data Portal brings together and continuously updates the relevant COVID-19 datasets and tools. The COVID-19 Data Portal enables researchers to upload, access and analyse COVID-19 related reference data and specialist datasets.

https://www.covid19dataportal.org/

You are looking for simulation tools?

Links to COVID-19 simulation tools.

MiTepid_sim

A Repository to Simulate the Spread of COVID-19 in any Population with a Known Age-Structure. The library can also be used to study the effects of vaccination in a population.

https://github.com/vahid-sb/MiTepid_sim

COVID-19 Analysis Portal

Provides an advanced human mobility model, and attach virus infection dynamics taken from recent literature and publications. This results in a virus spreading dynamics model.

https://covid-sim.info/

You are looking for a guideline how to contribute your own data on COVID-19?

Guidelines for data-sharing.

Zenodo – This is the final version of the Recommendations and Guidelines from the RDA COVID-19 Working Group has been endorsed through the official RDA process.

https://zenodo.org/record/3932953#.YI_DTe1xdPa

You want to make your analysis script available?

The toolbox provides a guideline to design data analysis scripts

Design guidelines for data analysis scripts

Paper presenting guidelines that help keep analysis code well organized, easy to understand and convenient to work with: 1. Each analysis step is one script, 2. A script either processes a single recording, or aggregates across recordings, never both, 3. One master script to run the entire analysis, 4. Save all intermediate results, 5. Visualize all intermediate results, 6. Each parameter and filename is defined only once, 7. Distinguish files that are part of the official pipeline from other scripts

https://arxiv.org/pdf/1904.06163.pdf

Publication and beyond

This category focuses on several aspects towards publication process and afterwards.

You want to publish you work?

These tools help to search for journals.

Sherpa Romeo is an online resource that aggregates and presents publisher and journal open access policies from around the world.

https://v2.sherpa.ac.uk/romeo/search.html

You want to make sure that your research will be recognized?

Here the toolbox provides tools helping to increase recognition of your research.

ELSEVIER Author services manuscript preparation

How to Select the Best Keywords for a Manuscript

https://scientific-publishing.webshop.elsevier.com/manuscript-preparation/how-choose-keywords-manuscript/

Medical Subject Headings

Suggestions for Finding Author Keywords using MeSH Tools

https://www.nlm.nih.gov/mesh/authors.html

Ten simple rules for getting started on Twitter as a scientist

https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1007513

The following part of the toolbox is intended to support research groups who are interested in health services research. This part focuses on implementation of clinical and observational research results on an organizational level. Most of the tools described go beyond specific COVID-19 research.
Preparation

This category focuses on tools to get an overview of research (literature, trials, data) available towards your study topic.

You are looking for literature related to COVID-19 research?

Try these systematic review tools.

Cochrane COVID-19 Study register

The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is a freely-available, continually-updated, annotated reference collection of human* primary studies on COVID-19. The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is „study-based,“ meaning references to the same study (e.g. press releases, trial registry records, preprints, journal pre-proofs, journal articles, retraction notices and expressions of concern) are all linked to a single study record.

https://covid-19.cochrane.org/

LitCovid

LitCovid curated literature hub for tracking up-to-date scientific information. LitCovid searches relevant articles in PubMed. The articles are updated daily and are further categorized by different research topics and geographic locations for improved access.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/research/coronavirus/

COVID19 evidence (Epistemonikos)

Health systematic reviews are organized by L·OVEs (i.e. a topic, a condition or a problem) using the PICO format (Population, Intervention, Comparisons, and Outcomes)

https://app.iloveevidence.com/loves/5e6fdb9669c00e4ac072701d?utm=ile

COVID-19 Evidence Reviews

It is cataloging COVID-19 evidence reviews and identifies new evidence reviews and reviews in progress. COVID-19 Rapid Review Sources: AHRQ; CADTH; COVID-19 and Mental Health Initiative; ECRI;COVID-19 Resource Center; Evidence Aid — Coronavirus (COVID-19): Evidence Collection; National COVID-19 Clinical Evidence Taskforce; NIPH Rapid Reviews; Cochrane COVID Rapid Reviews; COVID-END; etc.

https://www.covid19reviews.org/

You are looking for trials and research related to COVID-19?

The trial tracker and research monitoring tools can help.

Trialstreamer:

Trialstreamer is an artificial intelligence system, which finds and summarizes new trial publications, registrations, and preprints in COVID-19. We monitor databases continuously

https://trialstreamer.robotreviewer.net/

c.) You are looking for collaboration partners and stakeholders involves in certain research fields?

Kompetenznetz Public Health COVID-19

https://www.public-health-covid19.de

BESSI – Suppression of pandemics and epidemics cannot rely solely on waiting for effective vaccines and/or medical treatment: we need plans to use, improve & evaluate effective behavioural, environmental, social and systems interventions (BESSI) to reduce viral transmission. Research protocols are presented

https://www.bessi-collab.net/research

Intervention design in an organization

The following tools support the design of interventions directed to organizational change / implementation of evidence-based measures

You want to assess an organization in order to implement new measures?

Consolidated framework for Implementation research (CFIR)

The table lists Consolidated framework for Implementation research (CFIR) constructs by domain along with a short description. Clicking on the domain or construct name will take you to more information including: 1) Detailed description with a rationale for inclusion in CFIR, 2) Qualitative codebook guidelines, 3) Quantitative measures when available. There are downloadable constructs tables as PDF, Excel or Word-files

https://cfirguide.org/evaluation-design/overview/ https://cfirguide.org/constructs/

The CFIR-Interview guide

The CFIR-Interview guide provides templates for assessing the potential effect of different stakeholders in planned interventions: CFIR Booklet (cfirguide.org) There are further resources as supplementary materials in the following publication Fostering implementation of health services research findings into practice: a consolidated framework for advancing implementation science | Implementation Science | Full Text (biomedcentral.com) or https://rdcu.be/clhRi (Fulltext pdf)

You want to design an intervention for behavioral change?

CFIR Evaluation Design

Overview – The Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research (cfirguide.org) Constructs – The Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research (cfirguide.org)

The Joanna-Briggs Institute (JBI) has developed a collection of resources driven by the needs of health professionals for implementing evidence based medicine in to daily routine.

ebp – EPB Resources & Publications | Joanna Briggs Institute (jbi.global)

The JBI Manual for Evidence Implementation is intended to provide an overview of approaches to getting evidence into practice. There are different approaches that can be used to implement evidence into healthcare or community settings. The manual covers approaches utilised within JBI that can inform clinicians striving to get evidence into practice. It consists of step-by-step subsegments:

JBI Manual for Evidence Implementation – JBI Manual for Evidence Implementation – JBI GLOBAL WIKI

You are looking for tools to prepare a protocol?

These protocol development tools allow rapid, effective protocol development during the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Protocol Development toolkit

This Protocol Development Toolkit aims to support researchers in the protocol development process, by providing the tools and guidance to produce a high-quality health research Protocol. Concept Protocol: A Mixed-Methods Platform Trial for Assessing Public Health Interventions During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

https://coronavirus.tghn.org/covid-therapeutic-trials/protocol-development/

The Unity Studies: WHO Early Investigations Protocols

https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/technical-guidance/early-investigations

Registration

This category focuses on tools for (pre-)registration of studies.

You want (pre-)register your study?

Here are a few links to registration platforms.

Cochrane COVID-19 Study register

The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is a freely-available, continually-updated, annotated reference collection of human* primary studies on COVID-19. The Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register is „study-based,“ meaning references to the same study (e.g. press releases, trial registry records, preprints, journal pre-proofs, journal articles, retraction notices and expressions of concern) are all linked to a single study record.

https://covid-19.cochrane.org/

Data-Registries

Data registries for input of patient data

You want to enter patient data into a registry?

LEOSS: Lean European Open Survey on SARS-CoV-2 Infected Patients. The LEOSS public data set constitutes patient data from the LEOSS cohort after a data cleaning process.

https://leoss.net/

Note: There are many registries to be found worldwide Most registries focus on specific patient groups or entities. A separate specific search might be warranted.

You plan to implement a data-registry?

This publication by the AHRQ provides a Users Guide to develop Registries for Evaluating Patient Outcomes

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK208631/

How to assess intervention success

To check, if interventions have been tested before health technology assessments (HTA) might be useful. Although not COVID-specific, there are resources that provide an overview over complex interventions and their success. For long-term evaluation of implementation success, it might be useful to develop quality indicators.

You are looking for similar interventions and want to check if they were successful

HTA International Key Ressources Collection of HTA-resources (Covid 19 specific)

Key Resources | Health Technology Assessment International (HTAi)

ECRIN – European Clinical Research Infrastructure Network) – Collection of Health Technology Assessments

Collection of HTA-results from a European Collection (Non-Covid-19-specific)

http://outcome-measure.ecrin.org/

ECRIN-network – Collaborating organizations (Note: weblinks inside this collection are not curated, a separate search might be warranted)

Collection of institutions worldwide performing HTA in the ECRIN network

http://outcome-measure.ecrin.org/institution/

AHRQ (Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality)

Toolbox for the development of quality-indicators.

Tools for the development of quality-indicators can be found at (AHRQ)

https://www.qualityindicators.ahrq.gov/

AHRQ (Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality)

For the development of quality indicators software-tools may be useful

https://www.qualityindicators.ahrq.gov/Software/Default.aspx

OECD Quality indicator collection

A collection of established health care quality indicators can be found on website of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD):

https://www.oecd.org/els/health-systems/health-care-quality-indicators.htm

Publication and beyond

This category focuses on several aspects of the publication process and beyond.

You want to publish you work?

These tools can help to search for journals.

Sherpa Romeo is an online resource that aggregates and presents publisher and journal open access policies from around the world.

https://v2.sherpa.ac.uk/romeo/search.html

You want to make sure that your research will be recognized?

These tools can help to increase recognition of your research.

ELSEVIER Author services manuscript preparation

How to Select the Best Keywords for a Manuscript

https://scientific-publishing.webshop.elsevier.com/manuscript-preparation/how-choose-keywords-manuscript/

Medical Subject Headings

Suggestions for Finding Author Keywords using MeSH Tools

https://www.nlm.nih.gov/mesh/authors.html

Ten simple rules for getting started on Twitter as a scientist

https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1007513

Toolbox for preclinical studies

If you are searching for tools supporting your preclinical research we recommend the QUEST Toolbox on the Berlin Institute of Health @ Charité (BIH) Website. The QUEST Toolbox contains helpful tools, programs and online platforms aimed at facilitating the reproducibility of a research project on all stages.

Alphabetic list of all COVID-19 clinical research tools in this collection
AHRQ (Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality) Tools for the development of quality-indicators https://www.qualityindicators.ahrq.gov/ Toolbox
AHRQ software-tools https://www.qualityindicators.ahrq.gov/Software/Default.aspx Software collection
Behavioural, environmental, social and systems interventions (BESSI) https://www.bessi-collab.net/research Database
bioinf. Toolbox des EVBC http://evbc.uni-jena.de/tools/coronavirus-tools/ Toolbox  Coronavirus tools, Bioinformatic
Consolidated framework for Implementation research (CFIR) constructs https://cfirguide.org/evaluation-design/overview/ https://cfirguide.org/constructs/
CFIR-Interview guide CFIR Booklet (cfirguide.org) Booklet
CFIR-Evaluation Design Overview – The Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research (cfirguide.org) Resource collection
CFIR further resources Fostering implementation of health services research findings into practice: a consolidated framework for advancing implementation science | Implementation Science | Full Text (biomedcentral.com) or https://rdcu.be/clhRi Publication See supplementary material
ClinicalTrials.gov www.clinicaltrials.gov database Database, clinical trials
Cochrane COVID-19 Study register: https://covid-19.cochrane.org/ study database  collection of human* primary studies on COVID-19, including interventional, observational, diagnostic, prognostic, epidemiological and qualitative designs
COMET- CORE Outcome sets to COVID-19 https://www.comet-initiative.org/Studies/Details/1538 Core outcome sets COS for studies for the prevention of COVID-19 transmission; COS for studies of any intervention in hospitalised patients with confirmed or suspected COVID-19; COS for COVID-19 studies etc.
Coronavirus Explorer https://exbio.wzw.tum.de/covex/ Platform Protein-Protein-Interaktionsnetzwerk, Arzneimittelziele
COVID-19 Analysis Portal https://covid-sim.info/  Model, Epidemiology human mobility model, virus infection dynamics
COVID-19 Core Outcomes https://www.covid-19-cos.org/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7448717/pdf/ccm-48-01622.pdf    core outcomes for trials in COVID-19
COVID-19 Data Portal: https://www.covid19dataportal.org/ Data sharing portal  COVID-19 Data Platform consists of three connected components: SARS-CoV-2 Data Hubs, Federated European Genome-phenome Archive, COVID-19 Data Portal
COVID-19 EMA pandemic Task Force (COVID-ETF) https://www.ema.europa.eu/en/documents/other/mandate-objectives-rules-procedure-covid-19-ema-pandemic-task-force-covid-etf_en.pdf Expert group  EMA pandemic Task Force
COVID19 evidence (Epistemonikos) https://app.iloveevidence.com/loves/5e6fdb9669c00e4ac072701d?utm=ile literature search, review platform Broad syntheses, Systematic reviews, Primary studies
COVID-19 Evidence Reviews: https://www.covid19reviews.org/ review search tool Evidence reviews
COVID-19 evidence sources: https://www.mcmasterforum.org/networks/covid-end/resources-to-support-decision-makers/additional-supports/guide-to-key-covid-19-evidence-sources?fbclid=IwAR2XSYnVyypnIIIdTAzeeDDVlsulGqrxo4P4UxVn6avDZDm-s2cqA4rCRzo Toolbox for decision makers and researcher; public-health measures, clinical management of COVID-19, health-system arrangements
COVID-19 systematic online living evidence summary https://camarades.shinyapps.io/COVID-19-SOLES/ literature search, review platform  Search in PubMed, EMBASE, and Web of Science every week using COVID-19 search criteria
COVID19 Vaccine Tracker https://covid19.trackvaccines.org/ Monitoring Tool Vaccine tracker
COVID-19 vaccines results library https://www.zotero.org/groups/2528572/covid-19_vaccine_results/library  Vaccines results library  Vaccines
COVID-19: a living systematic map of the evidence: http://eppi.ioe.ac.uk/cms/Projects/DepartmentofHealthandSocialCare/Publishedreviews/COVID-19Livingsystematicmapoftheevidence/tabid/3765/Default.aspx Study Search Tool  up-to-date map of the current evidence
COVIDep https://covidep.ust.hk/ Platform Vaccine, vaccine target recommendations
COVID-NMA: https://covid-nma.com/ trials tracker for decision makers and researcher preventive interventions, treatments and vaccines
Design guidelines for data analysis scripts https://arxiv.org/pdf/1904.06163.pdf Data analysis data analysis, scripting, guidelines, programming
ECRIN – European Clinical Research Infrastructure Network) – Collection of Health Technology Assessments

http://outcome-measure.ecrin.org/

 database Non-Covid-19-specific
ECRIN – Institutions worldwide

http://outcome-measure.ecrin.org/institution/

 Collection of weblinks Collection of institutions performing HTA (Note: weblinks not curated)
estimate the contact rates of an age-stratified simulation model https://github.com/vahid-sb/MiTepid_sim library, simulation tool epidemiological model
ELSEVIER Author services manuscript preparation https://scientific-publishing.webshop.elsevier.com/manuscript-preparation/how-choose-keywords-manuscript/ Guideline, Publication How to Select the Best Keywords for a Manuscript
GECCO – German Corona Consensus – Covid-19 Research-Dataset https://art-decor.org/art-decor/decor-datasets–covid19f- auch hier zu finden: https://medical-data-models.org/41490 Research Dataset, Template patient data collection  Register, Dataset, Epidemiology
Global research on coronavirus disease (COVID-19): https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/global-research-on-novel-coronavirus-2019-ncov literature database diagnostics, vaccines and therapeutics
Health Technology Assessment International Key Ressources Key Resources | Health Technology Assessment International (HTAi) Database

Collection of HTA-resources (Covid 19 specific)
Implement a data registry

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK208631/

 Guideline Registries for Evaluating Patient Outcomes
Intervention Trials https://coronavirus.tghn.org/covid-therapeutic-trials/ Toolbox public health measures

ISARIC COVID-19 CCP Global Toolkit 

 https://isaric.org/research/covid-19-clinical-research-resources/ Toolbox  The tools aim to cover a range of tiers, suitable for different needs:
  • Data collection only
  • Contributing clinical data
  • Research protocols
  • Guidance to start your study
ISARIC’s affiliated studies

Joanna-Briggs Institute (JBI) collection of resources

 ebp – EPB Resources & Publications | Joanna Briggs Institute (jbi.global) Toolbox
JBI Manual for Evidence Implementation JBI Manual for Evidence Implementation – JBI Manual for Evidence Implementation – JBI GLOBAL WIKI Manual, Wiki
Journals https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1007513 Publication Awareness, Twitter
LEOSS (Lean European Open Survey on SARS-CoV-2) https://leoss.net/ Data registry Dataset, analysis on documented cases of the LEOSS study on the epidemiology of SARS-CoV‑2 Registration needed
LitCovid: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/research/coronavirus/ literature search, information platform   literature hub for tracking up-to-date scientific information, relevant articles in PubMed
LIVIVO COVID-19 collection: https://www.livivo.de/covid19 literature search, information platform medicine, health, nutrition, and
MDM-Portal (Medical Data Models) https://medical-data-models.org/search?query=Covid-19  meta-data registry
Medical Subject Headings https://www.nlm.nih.gov/mesh/authors.html Publication Suggestions for Finding Author Keywords using MeSH Tools
MiTepid_sim  https://github.com/vahid-sb/MiTepid_sim Simulation tool, vaccination effects, population Repository to Simulate the Spread of COVID-19 in any Population, effects of vaccination in a population
National COVID-19 Clinical Evidence Taskforce: LIVING GUIDELINES https://covid19evidence.net.au/#living-guidelines guidelines  Clinical care guidelines

Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) collection of health care quality indicators

https://www.oecd.org/els/health-systems/health-care-quality-indicators.htm Resource collection Not COVID-specific
OxCOVID19: https://covid19.eng.ox.ac.uk/ Tracker, Database  large multimodal relational database, Interactive, daily updated COVID-19 Tracker
PCFS https://osf.io/qgpdv/ Scale documentation, categorization, Post-COVID-19, patient functional status
preVIEW: COVID-19: https://preview.zbmed.de/ preprint monitor all Covid-19 related preprints
Protocol Development toolkit https://coronavirus.tghn.org/covid-therapeutic-trials/protocol-development/ Toolbox  protocol development process; tools and guidance to produce a high-quality health research Protocol
SARS-CoV-2 lineages https://cov-lineages.org/index.html Paper: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41564-020-0770-5 Web application, nomenclature  Pango lineages, Lineage Description List
SARS-CoV-2 vaccine development tracker https://vac-lshtm.shinyapps.io/ncov_vaccine_landscape/ Monitoring Tool Vaccine landscape, Clinical trials database, Efficacy trial map, Living review, vaccine distribution information
Sherpa Romeo https://v2.sherpa.ac.uk/romeo/search.html Publication Review and summary publisher, journal
transparimed https://www.transparimed.org/single-post/2020/03/27/COVID-19-clinical-trials-information-sources Overview of clinical trials information services (overview of trial databases) vaccines, treatments
Trialstreamer: https://trialstreamer.robotreviewer.net/ Monitoring Tool Trial monitoring by PICO
vaccines overview https://absolutelymaybe.plos.org/2020/12/20/why-two-vaccines-passed-the-finishing-line-in-a-year-and-others-didnt-and-a-month-12-roundup/ blog  Vaccines overview
WHO Early Investigations Protocols https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/technical-guidance/early-investigations
WHO R&D Good Participatory Practice for COVID-19 clinical trials: a toolbox https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/r-d-good-participatory-practice-for-covid-19-clinical-trials-a-toolbox Toolbox  COVID-19 Research Roadmap, synthesis of key action points, guide, overview, tips and resources
Zenodo: Guidelines on Data Sharing RDA COVID-19 Working Group https://zenodo.org/record/3932953#.X65KkKZYZPZ guideline Data sharing guideline
Contact

We appreciate any feedback on our toolbox. Please do not hesitate to contact us if you want a tool to be added or taken off the list or if you require any further features for this collection. We strongly encourage you to send us feedback via email.

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the following people for their very important and constructive input for constructing this toolbox:

  • Prof. Dr. Lena Ansmann (Division for Organizational Health Services Research, Department of Health Services Research, School of Medicine and Health Sciences, Carl von Ossietzky University Oldenburg, Oldenburg, Germany)
  • PD Dr. Lars G. Hemkens MPH (Department of Clinical Research at the University of Basel, Switzerland)
  • Prof. Dr. Stefan Nöst (Baden-Wuerttemberg Cooperative State University (DHBW) Stuttgart, School of Health Sciences and Management, Stuttgart, Germany)
  • Dr. Bob Siegerink (Center for Stroke Research Berlin, Charité-Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Germany; Dept. of Clinical Epidemiology, Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, The Netherlands)
  • PD Dr. Ulf Tölch (Berlin Institute of Health (BIH) at Charité, BIH QUEST Center for Transforming Biomedical Research)
  • Tracey Weissgerber, PhD (Berlin Institute of Health (BIH) at Charité, BIH QUEST Center for Transforming Biomedical Research)
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