Guidance on the conduct of narrative synthesis in systematic reviews: A product from the ESRC Methods Programme

“43 Using thematic analysis, patterns across studies were identified, with particular attention to differences in testing frequency, racial disparities, and the role of maternal, provider, and institutional factors.”

“This approach has been recommended when including both qualitative and quantitative research designs [29].”

“39 The analysis was organised around the six key domains of structural racism.”

“Phase 3 – Narrative Synthesis and Thematic Analysis: Given methodological heterogeneity across studies, a narrative synthesis approach was adopted (Popay et al., 2006), supplemented by frequency analysis of Pancasila dimensions addressed and descriptive statistics of effect sizes.”

“(2006) [27].”

“A combination of narrative synthesis (Popay et al. 2006) and tables was used for data presentation.”

“We analyzed outcomes using narrative synthesis, a technique for exploring relationships between studies after the preliminary synthesis of findings (37, 38).”

“Additionally, the narrative review identifies new areas of study that have yet to be addressed [12].”

“18 The descriptive synthesis provided an overview of the characteristics of the studies, including case mix, study designs, methodologies, objectives, outcomes and study quality.”

“This was followed by identification of the patterns and relationships among key themes, and a thematic synthesis (Popay et al., 2006).”

“We will follow the framework outlined by Popay et al , 93 which involves four key stages: 1.”

“It then integrates the evidence using an additional synthesis method, which in our case was a narrative synthesis to incorporate findings from both qualitative and quantitative studies[20,21].”

“41 To comprehensively integrate the research, we revisited the final studies that met the selection criteria.”

“The narrative synthesis will follow the Guidance on the Conduct of Narrative Synthesis in Systematic Reviews 32 .”

“A narrative synthesis is a type of systematic review where databases are searched for relevant research and results of included studies are combined to describe, summarize, and explain the findings narratively (Popay et al., 2006).”

“51”

“Given the inclusion of both qualitative and quantitative studies, a narrative synthesis approach was used to integrate and interpret the diverse data (24) .”

“The narrative synthesis method was used for data analysis (Popay et al., 2006).”

“Findings were therefore synthesized narratively using structured vote counting based on the direction of effects (Campbell et al., 2020; Popay et al., 2006), in which effects are classified by direction and tabulated rather than pooled.”

“After removing 3,600 duplicate records and 200 records for other reasons, 7,162 titles and abstracts were screened.”

“57 58 Narrative synthesis followed 56 .”

“Thematic narrative synthesis was used as an analysis technique suitable for qualitative systematic reviews in which a collection of diverse data sources are synthe-sised to reach a narrative conclusions that interprets complex, multi-dimensional phenomena (Popay et al. 2006).”

“The translation technique, as described by Popay et al , 60 was applied to explore relationships between qualitative and quantitative findings.”

“A structured narrative synthesis was therefore conducted, consistent with established methodological guidance for synthesizing complex and heterogeneous evidence [29].”

“Furthermore, current evidence confirms that breastfeeding practices and the timing of gluten introduction do not modify CD risk, whereas early-life gluten quantity, broader dietary patterns, and gut dysbiosis emerge as critical but complex environmental triggers.”

“Narrative synthesis was therefore employed to provide a structured textual account of the findings, guided by the framework proposed by Popay et al. [22].”

“It is important to mention that this review considered a narrative synthesis approach to address multidimensional research topics and study designs of the final selected articles: synthesizing texts from several studies, summarising the study results, and explaining the findings [18, 41].”

“Instead, Section 4.2 presented a structured narrative synthesis following the three elements of Popay et al. (2006): (1) developing a preliminary synthesis by organizing findings by aviation-specific risk factor themes (e.g., hypoxia, fatigue, sleep deprivation); (2) exploring relationships in the…”

“A narrative synthesis approach was therefore selected as it allows for the integration of diverse evidence types and facilitates exploration of relationships within and across the three domains of interest [20].”

“Findings were synthesised narratively according to the principal outcome domains of progression to type 2 diabetes mellitus, glycaemic control, weight and anthropometric outcomes, and cardiovascular risk markers [19,33].”

“A narrative synthesis was conducted [27].”

“…narrative synthesis was informed by established guidance on narrative and systematic literature reviews and moved beyond simple vote-counting by comparing findings across diversification type, institutional context, research design, and reported D-P outcome (Snyder 2019; Popay et al. 2006).”

“A narrative synthesis was therefore conducted [15].”

“Thus, a narrative synthesis of the findings was developed, following established guidance on the conduct of narrative synthesis in systematic reviews [24].”

“…and outcomes, a narrative thematic synthesis was conducted to explore how somatic and body-based practices are integrated into higher education counselling and psychotherapy training programmes, how they are used pedagogically, and what benefits and challenges are reported (Popay et al., 2006).”

“Rather, thematic analysis and narrative synthesis have been carried out according to the framework of Popay et al. (2006).”

“The results were therefore examined qualitatively to explore diagnostic performance, concordance patterns, sources of discordance, and their relevance to precision oncology practice [23].”

“Además, los datos se sintetizaron mediante un enfoque narrativo estructurado, siguiendo las directrices de Popay et al., (2006), dado que la heterogeneidad clínica y metodológica entre estudios (diferentes instrumentos, poblaciones y contextos) desaconsejaba la realización de un metaanálisis formal.”

“The findings will be synthesized using narrative synthesis methods in accordance with guidance from Popay et al. [22].”

“Adhering to the guidance provided by Popay et al. (2006), the synthesis was carried out in three phases: (1) preliminary theoretical model developed from foundational literature (Section 3); (2) organizing findings from retrieved qualitative, conceptual, and documentary literature around the five…”

“This approach synthesized results narratively and enabled deeper insights into reported practices, implementation contexts, and influential factors in EBSS use within STEM education, as well as challenges and limitations (Popay et al., 2006).”

“Given the heterogeneity in study designs, populations, and outcome measures, a narrative synthesis approach was adopted following Popay et al. (2006) guidelines.”

“Following a narrative synthesis approach [24], studies were grouped into comparisons of DC versus usual care, and assessments of DC session frequency.”

“A narrative synthesis [23] was performed for this review.”

“We performed a systematic narrative synthesis to interpret, describe, and summarise the variation in prenatal screening across SEA countries and factors influencing implementation success [33].”

“A narrative synthesis will be employed, as combining data across different studies would not be feasible [55].”

“In line with the recommendations of Popay et al. [61], a narrative synthesis of the available evidence was conducted, and a thematic analysis was used to group findings based on TBMC characteristics (e.g., provider types, staffing patterns, electronic health record utilization, etc.) [61].”

“28 33 Quality assessment Potential sources of bias will be identified throughout the mapping process and documented during data charting, and then re-evaluated.”

“Therefore, we performed a narrative synthesis according to the ESRC guidance [12].”

“The narrative synthesis methodology followed the UK Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) framework for synthesising heterogeneous quantitative and qualitative evidence [14].”

“The matrix’s use of cross-tabulation to identify both recurrent patterns and knowledge gaps is consistent with the conventions of evidence mapping [47], narrative synthesis [44], and research-gap identification from systematic reviews [48].”

“…(Higgins et. al., 2019) The synthesis of findings across the included studies was conducted using a narrative synthesis approach, as outlined by Popay et al. (2006), which is particularly suited to systematic reviews in which the heterogeneity of study designs and contexts precludes the use of…”

“This synthesis logic was informed by established guidance on narrative synthesis (Popay et al., 2006), particularly in developing a preliminary synthesis, exploring relationships across sources, and considering robustness, and was adapted here for a theory-informed integrative review.”

“The analysis followed a structured four-step process, theory development, developing a preliminary synthesis, exploring relationships within and between studies, and assessing the robustness of the synthesis as recommended by Popay et al. in 2006 (Popay et al., 2006).”

“This guideline offers advice on conducting narrative synthesis in the context of systematic reviews of research evidence that addresses questions concerning the effects of interventions and those concerned with the implementation of interventions proven effective in experimental settings [44].”

“Data were synthesised using a narrative approach, which is well suited to the integration of evidence derived from studies with diverse designs and outcome measures [12].”

“Textual narrative synthesis is an approach to systematic literature reviews that employs a standardized data extraction format that allows for the examination of relationships within and between studies (Popay et al., 2006).”

“Instead, the Narrative Synthe - sis Approach (Popay et al., 2006) was used, to synthesise findings, using words and text to summarize and explain the results across studies.”

“Given the exploratory nature of this scoping review, we employed a narrative synthesis approach as described by Popay et al. [16].”

“22 In line with Popay et al , the synthesis followed an iterative process of organising, comparing and interpreting extracted data, guided by the following analytic framework.”

“Consequently, we employed a narrative syn - thesis approach, guided by the framework proposed by Popay et al [19].”

“Data were grouped according to types of therapy [20].”

“This review used select published tools and techniques including tabulation of data, groupings and clusters, and vote counting [74] to develop the prelimi-nary synthesis.”

“31 This approach was selected as meta-analysis was not feasible to render a meaningful overarching conclusion, considering the heterogeneity of the included studies, in terms of target populations/conditions, types of AH services, comparators, units of measure for effects, and methods for obtaining…”

“We used the Economic and Social Research Console Guide (Popay et al., 2006) immersion , and mixed approaches.”

“Synthesis was informed by Popay et al.'s (2006) framework and guidance from Siddaway et al. (2019) and Baumeister and Leary (1997).”

“…as depression, anxiety, illness perceptions, and low self-efficacy; social and economic factors such as low health literacy, inadequate social support, medication costs, and cultural stigmas; and treatment-related factors such as complex regimens, side effects, and a lack of perceived benefit [6].”

“The Narrative Synthesis (NS) guidelines will allow us to transparently report the data from the included studies [25].”

“We derive a narrative synthesis (Popay et al, 2006; CRD, 2009) of the qualitative evidence from studies that are dissimilar in terms of methods used and/or questions types of innovation investigated.”