Table 1 Evidence profile for important information point in national colposcopy leaflet: “indicate that treatment can occur at the first colposcopy clinic visit”.

Studies	Assessment					Summary of findings
	Design	Quality	Consistency * across studies	Directness †	Other factors‡	Overall assessment	Overall recommendation
Gath, 199547	Non‐comparative descriptive	++	No important inconsistency	DirectDirect	None	Very low
Olamijulo, 199730	Non‐comparative descriptive	+
Howells, 199931	Randomised trial	++		Uncertain
							Definite
Kuehner, 200148	Qualitative	++	No important inconsistency	Direct	Close conformity based on direct evidence	High
Byrom, 200328	Qualitative	++		Direct
Neale, 200329	Qualitative	++		Direct

• The quantitative studies indicated that the provision of a colposcopy leaflet or sheet containing information about the possibility of treatment at the first colposcopy clinic visit was acceptable to women. A need for clearer information about the possibility of receiving treatment at the initial visit was identified.

• The qualitative studies reported that women have unanswered questions about whether treatment will be received on the day of the colposcopy appointment.

*Consistency among quantitative studies refers to the similarity of estimates of effect or observations across studies.⁴⁶ Consistency among qualitative studies refers to similarities in developed themes and participant experiences across studies.

†Directness refers to the extent to which people, interventions and findings are similar to the NHSCSP population.

‡Other factors include imprecise or sparse data, strong or very strong association, high risk of reporting bias, evidence of a dose‐response gradient, effect of plausible residual confounding and close conformity of findings based on direct evidence (see box 7).