Literature Search
A literature search for relevant articles was conducted using the two major databases Scopus and PubMed. The Scopus search strategy was as follows:
(cardiac OR cardio OR heart OR pericardial OR pericardiotomy OR intrapericardial) AND adhesion* AND (barrier* OR seprafilm OR gortex OR ”gor-tex” OR polytetrafluoroethylene OR tachosil)
The PubMed search strategy was as follows:
(”Cardiac Surgical Procedures”[Mesh] OR cardiac[ti] OR cardio[ti] OR ”Heart”[Mesh] OR heart[ti] OR pericardial[ti] OR pericardiotomy[ti] OR intrapericardial[ti]) AND (”Tissue Adhesions”[Mesh] OR adhesion*[tw]) AND (barrier*[tw] OR seprafilm[tw] OR gortex[tw] OR ”gor-tex”[tw] OR polytetrafluoroethylene[tw] OR tachosil[tw])
Both databases were searched on November 24, 2020 with no limit for article dates. Inclusion criteria were clinical studies on human subjects, and exclusion criteria were case reports and studies published in a language other than English.
Two reviewers separately performed the initial title and abstract screening for all articles followed by the full-text review. Specific reasons were provided for the articles excluded during full-text review. Conflicts at any stage were resolved by a third reviewer. Of the resulting full-text articles, any reference(s) of other adhesion barrier(s) was assessed through a similar title and abstract screening with subsequent full-text review. The Covidence systematic review software (Veritas Health Innovation, Melbourne, Australia) was used as the primary screening and evaluation tool for all reviewers. Risk of bias in the studies was evaluated by a single reviewer using the Cochrane Risk of Bias Tool.10