Methods Section Sanity Checker

Catch missing CONSORT, STROBE, and PRISMA reporting-guideline items in your methods section before a journal reviewer does.

Catch missing CONSORT, STROBE, or PRISMA items in your methods section in 2 seconds — Google Docs + Paste tab. No AI. Methods Section Sanity Checker scans the methods section of your manuscript draft against the CONSORT 2025, STROBE, or PRISMA 2020 reporting guideline in under two seconds — and flags missing, partially addressed, or fully addressed items with the official guideline language and a curated example sentence from a published paper. Built for graduate students and early-career researchers writing first-author papers in medicine, public health, and biomedical sciences. —————————————————————— WHAT IT DOES • Scans your Google Docs draft directly with one click — or any methods section text from Overleaf, Word, Pages, Scrivener, or any other editor via the side panel's Paste tab. • Picks the right guideline for your study type: CONSORT 2025 (RCTs), STROBE (cohort, case-control, cross-sectional), or PRISMA 2020 (systematic reviews and meta-analyses). • Returns a three-color report — detected (green), partial (amber), not detected (red) — with every flagged item showing the official EQUATOR-network guideline language verbatim. • For every missing or partial item, displays one curated example sentence from a published paper showing how to address it. • "Mark as addressed" override persists per document so unusual phrasings the engine misses are dismissed permanently. • "Copy summary" button puts a plain-text checklist on your clipboard, ready to email to your supervisor or paste into a TODO file. —————————————————————— WHO IT'S FOR • PhD students, early-career researchers, postdocs, and clinicians writing their first few first-author manuscripts. • Supervisors doing pre-submission spot checks on student drafts. • Anyone who has ever had a paper desk-rejected for missing reporting-guideline items. —————————————————————— PRIVACY POSTURE • Your draft never leaves your browser. Detection runs locally in pure JavaScript over curated keyword libraries. • No AI, no LLM calls, no machine learning — period. The "AI" was used only at planning time, not at runtime. • Scoped to docs.google.com/document/* only. The extension cannot run on any other website. • The only thing transmitted to our servers is your license key, once every 7 days, for revalidation. Document content is never sent. • No tracking, no analytics, no telemetry, no fingerprinting in the extension itself. —————————————————————— PRICING • 7-day free Pro trial — entirely in-extension, no card required. • $5 / month or $29 / year (save $31). • Refund within 7 days of purchase, no questions asked. • Mastering Research book readers: use code MASTERINGRESEARCH for $14.50/year (first 100 customers). —————————————————————— GUIDELINES IN v1 • CONSORT 2025 — randomised controlled trials (parallel, factorial, cluster, crossover). • STROBE — observational studies (cohort, case-control, cross-sectional). • PRISMA 2020 — systematic reviews and meta-analyses. Roadmap: STARD (diagnostic accuracy) and SPIRIT (trial protocols) ship in v1.1, ~4–6 weeks post-launch. CARE, ARRIVE 2.0, CHEERS, SQUIRE, TRIPOD+AI, SRQR, COREQ, and TIDieR roll out monthly thereafter. Annual subscribers get every new guideline at no extra cost. —————————————————————— LIMITATIONS — HONEST UP FRONT • Direct in-place scanning supports Google Docs only in v1. For Overleaf, Word, Pages, Scrivener, and other editors, paste your methods section text into the side panel's Paste tab — same engine, same report. Overleaf as a one-click integration returns in v1.1. • English-language drafts only in v1. Multilingual support (Spanish, French, German, Mandarin, Japanese) is on the long-term roadmap. • The keyword libraries are conservative on purpose — high precision, accepting some false negatives. If the engine misses an obviously-correct phrasing, click "Mark as addressed" and email us the sentence so we can fold it into the next library update. —————————————————————— COMPANION RESOURCES Methods Section Sanity Checker is built alongside the Mastering Research book series — eight titles covering research design, execution, and publishing for graduate students and early-career researchers. Both share the same audience and the same philosophy: practical, clearly explained, and respectful of your time and budget. Learn more, view help, or start your trial: https://www.gradsummit.com/tools/methods-checker/ Help and troubleshooting: https://www.gradsummit.com/tools/methods-checker/troubleshooting/ Support: support@gradsummit.com