Table 2.

Key informant interviews: perspectives on review methods

Element	Theme	Sample quotes [type of end-user]
Literature search	It is okay to limit the search by database, journal, year, etc. as long as it is scientifically justified	“I’d probably be more comfortable with selecting top 20 [journals]…and just do the evidence review using those.” [guideline developer] “I would not expect things like looking for unpublished literature.” [payer] “you…probably you get 90% or 95% of the evidence with 20% to 30% of the searching” [provider]
Abstract/full-text screening	It is acceptable to have single review of abstracts and full text	“To me that [single review] would be acceptable.” [research funder] “I think implicitly in these kinds of rapid reviews…you’re going to do a combination of looking at existing reviews so that will help catch stuff that you might otherwise miss with single review.” [provider]
Quality assessment	Some assessment of literature quality is necessary	“I think that [quality assessment] should be included.” [payer] “it’s important that we probably would want some level of comment on that [quality assessment]” [provider]
Data tables/extraction	Evidence tables are useful	“I think the most important part of an evidence review is always going to be the evidence tables” [guideline developer] “one part that we use a lot are of course the extraction tables” [guideline developer]
Quality/strength of evidence	Quality/strength of evidence is important	“That [strength of evidence grading] would be very important.” [payer] “The strength of the evidence I always find valuable as well.” [provider]
Summary tables	Summary tables or ways to present the results/conclusions in an accessible format are useful	“A lot of times you’ll do good summary tables, and that’s probably where I would look…” [payer] “The work development teams in our clinical programs are more concerned with what’s the summary of the evidence.” [provider]
Future research recommendations	Future research recommendations are helpful for research development	“…what are the future research recommendations…99.9% of the systematic reviews all concluded more research is needed, so focus on exactly what are they recommending.” [research funder]

Comments that are italicized represent most acceptable trade-offs