A QuESt for speed : rapid qualitative evidence syntheses as a response to the COVID-19 pandemic

Abstract

Background

The COVID-19 pandemic has created a sense of urgency in the research community in their bid to contribute to the evidence required for healthcare policy decisions. With such urgency, researchers experience methodological challenges to maintain the rigour and transparency of their work. With this in mind, we offer reflections on our recent experience of undertaking a rapid Cochrane qualitative evidence synthesis (QES).

Methods

This process paper, using a reflexive approach, describes a rapid QES prepared during, and in response to, the COVID-19 pandemic.

Findings

This paper reports the methodological decisions we made and the process we undertook. We place our decisions in the context of guidance offered in relation to rapid reviews and previously conducted QESs. We highlight some of the challenges we encountered in finding the balance between the time needed for thoughtfulness and comprehensiveness whilst providing a rapid response to an urgent request for evidence.

Conclusion

The need for more guidance on rapid QES remains, but such guidance needs to be based on actual worked examples and case studies. This paper and the reflections offered may provide a useful framework for others to use and further develop.

Metadata

Item Type:	Article
Authors/Creators:	Biesty, L. Meskell, P. Glenton, C. Delaney, H. Smalle, M. Booth, A. https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4808-3880 Chan, X.H.S. Devane, D. Houghton, C.
Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information:	© The Author(s). 2020 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.
Keywords:	COVID-19; Qualitative evidence synthesis; Rapid reviews; Review methods; Systematic review
Dates:	Accepted: 26 October 2020 Published (online): 4 November 2020 Published: December 2020
Institution:	The University of Sheffield
Academic Units:	The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health (Sheffield) > School of Health and Related Research (Sheffield) > ScHARR - Sheffield Centre for Health and Related Research
Depositing User:	Symplectic Sheffield
Date Deposited:	13 Nov 2020 10:15
Last Modified:	13 Nov 2020 10:15
Status:	Published
Publisher:	BioMed Central
Refereed:	Yes
Identification Number:	10.1186/s13643-020-01512-5
Related URLs:	PubMed URL
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID):	oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:167969

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A QuESt for speed : rapid qualitative evidence syntheses as a response to the COVID-19 pandemic

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