Table 1.

Table of included studies

					Participant characteristics
Study	Country	Setting	CFS/ME diagnostic criteria	Number of participants	Age range (years)	Males/females	Illness duration	Aim	Data collection	Data analysis
Jelbert et al47	UK	Outpatient clinic	None specified. Clinical diagnosis of CFS/ME	5	13–18	1:4	1.5–2 years	Recovered adolescent experiences of CFS/ME	Semistructured interviews	Interpretative phenomenological analysis
Fisher and Crawley48	UK	Outpatient clinic	None specified. Clinical diagnosis of CFS/ME. Above the 90th percentile cut-off on SCAS Scale	11	12–18	2:9	NS	Anxious young people's experiences of CFS/ME	Interviews	Interpretative phenomenological analysis
Hareide et al54	Norway	Hospital	Modified version of the CDC criteria—3 rather than 6 months duration of fatigue	9	12–17	NS	2.5 years	Illness beliefs and coping strategies among adolescents with CFS/ME	Semistructured interviews	Thematic analysis
Winger et al51	Norway	Hospital and primary care	3 months of unexplained fatigue (RCPCH and NICE)	17	12–18	5:12	NS	Experience of being an adolescent with CFS/ME	In-depth interviews	Phenomenological hermeneutical design
Beasant et al55	UK	Specialist CFS/ME service	NICE 2007. Mild to moderately affected	12	12–18	3:9	9–18 months	Experiences of adolescents and families accessing a specialist service	In-depth interviews	Thematic analysis
Crix et al46	UK	Hospital	None specified. Clinical diagnosis of CFS/ME	1	16	0:1	1–2 years	How members of one family define and understand a contested diagnosis through talk	Family interview	Discourse analysis
Ashby et al49	UK	CAMHS	None specified. Clinical diagnosis of CFS/ME	10	8–16	3:7	3 months–2 years	Service users’ perceptions of the treatment they received	Semistructured interviews	None specified
Patel52	UK	Specialist CFS/ME service	NICE 2007, mild to moderately affected (not housebound)	7	8–16	5:2	NS	Illness domains that are important to young people with CFS/ME and their parents	Semistructured interviews Focus group with three mothers	Thematic analysis
Williams-Wilson53	UK	Specialist CFS/ME service	Clinical diagnosis of CFS/ME	8	11–18	2:6	NS	Personal experiences of young people with CFS/ME	Open-ended interviews	Thematic analysis
Lombard50	South Africa	Through medical doctors	CDC	2	17	2:0	NS	Description of living with CFS/ME to create guidelines	Interviews, document analysis and observation	Phenomenology

CAMHS, child and adolescent mental health service; CFS/ME, chronic fatigue syndrome/myalgic encephalomyelitis; NS, not stated; RCPCH, Royal College of Paediatrics & Child Health; SCAS, Spence Children's Anxiety Scale.