While it was initially restricted to medicine, as of 2021[update], it also accepts protocols in criminology, social care, education and international development, as long as there is a health-related outcome.
The database is produced by the Centre for Reviews and Dissemination at the University of York in England, and it is funded by the National Institute for Health Research.
[1] Registration of systematic reviews in the database has been supported by PLoS Medicine,[2] BioMed Central, the EQUATOR Network, and BMJ editor-in-chief Fiona Godlee, among others.
The resulting PROSPERO database was launched in February 2011 by Frederick Curzon, 7th Earl Howe, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health.
It was simultaneously launched at a Vancouver, Canada meeting organized by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research that month.