Exploring important service characteristics of telephone cancer information and support services for callers: protocol for a systematic review of qualitative research

IntroductionAs cancer incidence continues to rise, challenges remain in how to communicate accurate, timely information to people with cancer, their families and healthcare professionals. One option is to provide support and comprehensive, tailored information via a telephone cancer information and support service (CISS). This systematic review aims to summarise the service characteristics of telephone CISS and identify what aspects of services are important from callers’ perspectives.Methods and analysisA comprehensive literature search will be conducted for articles published from database inception to 30 March 2023 (OVID MEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL, PsycINFO and SocINDEX). Published, peer-reviewed, articles reporting qualitative research on the service characteristics of telephone CISS important to callers in any language will be included. One researcher will complete the searches, two researchers will independently screen results for eligible studies and a third researcher will resolve any disagreement. A narrative and thematic synthesis of studies will be provided. Study characteristics will be independently extracted by one researcher and checked by a second. Included studies’ methodological quality will be evaluated independently by two researchers using the 2022 Critical Appraisal Skills Programme Qualitative Studies Checklist. Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation-Confidence in the Evidence from Reviews of Qualitative research tool will assess the confidence of the review findings.Ethics and disseminationEthics approval is not required for this research as it is a planned systematic review of published literature. Findings will be presented at leading cancer, health economic and supportive care conferences, published in a peer-reviewed journal, and disseminated via websites and social media.PROSPERO registration numberCRD42023413897.