Review-Paper Skill
The review-article counterpart to write-paper (original research). For reviewing someone
else's review article, use /peer-review or /self-review (the RV1-RV9 probes) instead.
Step 0 — Format + spine axis (the structure-determining choice)
- Confirm format with the user: narrative (SANRA) | scoping (PRISMA-ScR + JBI) | systematic (PRISMA 2020). This decides the reporting guideline and the registration path.
- Choose the spine axis — the single most consequential decision: organize the body by modality (e.g. 2D → 3D), by task (generation / QA / deployment), or by lifecycle stage. Every body section then follows this one axis; mixing axes is the most common structural failure.
- Require a scope statement + non-overlap boundary against prior/adjacent reviews — this pre-empts the reviewer's first question, "why another review on this?" (user-approval checkpoint: confirm the boundary with the user before scaffolding).
Step 1 — Scaffold the macro skeleton for the format
Load ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/macro_skeleton.md and write the section for the chosen
format to manuscript.md in the manuscript directory, with the summary-table stubs (Step 2) and
that section's figure/table legend plan. The structure depends on the format:
- Narrative — the 7-part skeleton below.
- Scoping / systematic — IMRaD with one Methods and one Results slot per PRISMA-ScR or PRISMA 2020 item (the reference lists them by item number). Do not use the 7-part skeleton for these: it has no place for eligibility criteria, search, selection, charting/extraction, risk of bias or synthesis methods, nor for study-selection results. The thematic body by spine axis goes inside Results → synthesis; frontiers and the evaluation-metrics critique go inside Discussion.
The narrative 7-part skeleton:
- Abstract — a 4-5 move version (structured for scoping/systematic).
- Introduction — clinical motivation → technology → scope + non-overlap block (required field, all formats) → "this review…".
- Background / technical principles — tight; cite once, do not re-survey the field.
- Thematic body by spine axis — each section ends with a summary table (stub generated to match the type, Step 2).
- Frontiers / what is advancing.
- Challenges / discussion — include an evaluation-metrics critique subsection (a required quality signal: how the field measures itself, and where those metrics mislead).
- Conclusion — measured. A scoping review maps the evidence; it issues no recommendation-grade language or clinical recommendations.
Every citekey must resolve to the project's verified _src/refs.bib (produced by /search-lit →
/lit-sync → /verify-refs). If a claim needs a reference not yet in the library, leave a
[@NEW:short-topic] placeholder and route it to /search-lit; never fabricate a DOI, author,
year, or citekey.
Step 2 — Summary-table stub (matched to type)
- Narrative / scoping:
study | year | [spine-axis value] | method | key finding. - Systematic: PRISMA flow + a study-characteristics table + an extraction table.
The stub ships with column headers and one placeholder row. Cells (study, year, metric, finding) are filled only from sources the user supplies or that are verified; an unknown cell stays a placeholder.
Step 3 — Reporting + registration wiring
- Scoping → PRISMA-ScR (+ JBI charting) + OSF registration.
- Narrative → SANRA (a 6-item appraisal aid, not a reporting checklist — do not over-enforce it).
- Systematic → PRISMA 2020 (+ PROSPERO registration).
- If
/check-reportingdoes not carry the chosen checklist (it bundles PRISMA-ScR and PRISMA 2020, not SANRA), track a manual gap table and flag it for the user rather than silently skipping the item.
Step 4 — QC hand-off
Run the standard manuscript QC chain, which this skill is designed to feed:
/self-review— the RV1-RV9 narrative-review probes auto-activate for a review article./check-reporting— PRISMA-ScR or PRISMA 2020 (SANRA via the Step 3 manual table)./verify-refs— every citation resolves; 0 FABRICATED / MISMATCH./humanize— AI-pattern density below threshold./academic-aio— discoverability pass (optional).
Convergence gate — the draft is not done until: self-review fatal = 0; verify-refs
FABRICATED/MISMATCH = 0; no [@NEW:...] placeholder citations remain; humanize density < 2.0.
Guards
- Proportionate self-citation; declare an intellectual conflict of interest when an author has contributed to the area being reviewed.
- Write only inside the manuscript directory.
