Designathons in health research: a global systematic review
Introduction A designathon is a three-stage participatory activity informed by design thinking. There is a growing literature on designathons in health. This study synthesised designathons’ effectiveness and implementation-related factors to address health challenges. Methods We searched Cochrane Library, Embase, PubMed, Scopus and the ClinicalTrials.gov registry for articles containing primary data on designathons for health from their dates of inception to 29 November 2022. We retrieved additional studies from citation searching and a complementary open call. We synthesised data on designathons’ effectiveness (ie, engagement, outputs and implementation), required resources and implementation-related factors (ie, resources, facilitators, barriers, strengths and limitations). We assessed the risk of bias using a checklist adapted from Joanna Briggs Institute Critical Appraisal tools. Results In total, 4973 citations were identified, and 42 studies were included. In total, 26 studies (6