Table 1.
The study criteria to assess quality of qualitative studies
| Topic | Guide question/description |
|---|---|
| Title and abstract | |
| Title | Does the title of the study describe the nature and topic of the study e.g. qualitative study, healthcare access, phenomenology, women with disabilities, etc. |
| Abstract | Has the purpose of study, design and approach of the study, participants, the study date and the summary of key findings been provided in the abstract? |
| Introduction | |
| Context and problem statement | Have description of the problem, its significance, background been explained in the introduction of the study? |
| Purpose or research question | Have objectives and questions of the study been cited vividly? |
| Study design | |
| Qualitative approach | What is the methodological orientation of the study? e.g. Grounded theory, content analysis, phenomenology, ethnography |
| Participation selection | |
| Sampling | How research participants were selected? Purposive, snowball, consecutive, convenience |
| Description of sample | The needed Details about participants. (E.g. gender, age, kind of disability, marital status, employment status, residence status, etc.) |
| Sample size | How many participants were in the study? |
| Data collection | |
| Research team and reflexivity | Has the researcher/interviewer explained about her/his personal characteristics, knowledge, trainings, and experiences in the study? |
| Method of data collection | How the researcher communicate with the participants? Telephone, individual face to face interview, focus group, etc. |
| Setting of data collecting | Where was the interview held? |
| Interview guide | Have the interview questions been provided by the authors in the paper? |
| Audio/ visual recording | Has the researcher used audio/visual recording to collect the data? |
| Duration | How long did the interviews last? |
| Analysis and findings | |
| Description of the coding tree | Has the researcher cited the process of coding qualitative data? e.g. open coding, axial coding and selective coding |
| Categorization of the study’s findings | Have the study findings been shown in a table? e.g. code, subcategory, category, theme |
| Data analysis | Has the researcher described the method of data analysis e.g. Thematic, framework, content analysis or grounded theory |
| Software | Has the researcher used a software to manage the data? e.g. MAXQDA or NVivo |