Zero-shot Generative Large Language Models for Systematic Review Screening Automation

Systematic reviews are crucial for evidence-based medicine as they comprehensively analyse published research findings on specific questions. Conducting such reviews is often resource- and time-intensive, especially in the screening phase, where abstracts of publications are assessed for inclusion in a review. This study investigates the effectiveness of using zero-shot large language models~(LLMs) for automatic screening. We evaluate the effectiveness of eight different LLMs and investigate a calibration technique that uses a predefined recall threshold to determine whether a publication should …

automation cs.cl cs.ir evidence generative inclusion language language models large language large language models medicine publications questions research review reviews screening study zero-shot