Search strategy
All articles published between 1st Jan 1980 and 13th May
2015 were eligible for inclusion. No limits were set in
terms of language used or study design. A search of electronic
databases was conducted on 13th March 2015
using the following databases: Cinahl, Cochrane Library,
Embase, Medline, ProQuest Central, ProQuest Dissertations
and Theses, Scopus and Web of Science. Using a
Boolean approach, we searched the electronic databases
for any possible combination of the keywords listed in
Table 1.
The reference lists of those studies which were considered
eligible for inclusion (see below) were scanned for
additional relevant studies. Two international experts in
the field of testicular cancer and/or cancer epidemiology
were contacted via email, and given a list of those studies
which met our inclusion criteria. They were asked to
identify any studies that had been missed by our search.