Inclusion and exclusion criteria, with accompanying rationale
| Inclusion criteria | Exclusion criteria | Rationale |
|---|---|---|
| Research presents original data | Commentaries, insights, letters to the editor, systematic review and/or meta-analysis, and literature reviews | Allowing for the assessment of quality, bias, and extraction of data for qualitative/quantitative synthesis |
| The exposure of interest is any component of the patient journey involving primary care. This ranges between the patient deciding to access dental services/primary medical care for an oral complaint, to the point at which the patient is referred to secondary or tertiary care | Study presents data solely on the patient journey component from the onset of symptoms to the decision to access dental services/primary medical care for an oral complaint, and/or from referral to secondary or tertiary care to diagnosis | Allows for the synthesis of evidence relating to the primary care component of the diagnostic journey |
| The patient journey component is clearly defined, with a specific start and endpoint | Study fails to define the component within the patient journey | Required to ensure the component described relates solely to the primary care component of the diagnostic process |
| The pathological focus is confirmed primary squamous cell malignancy of the oral cavity or oropharynx | The pathological focus is non-primary oral malignancy, non-squamous cell malignancy of the oral cavity or oropharynx, or malignancy of other anatomical locations. All studies investigating screening or diagnostic tools in both healthy and diseased populations are to be excluded | The focus of this review is squamous cell carcinoma of the oral cavity and oropharynx, and thus study of other types of malignancy would not be in line with the overarching research question |
| The reported outcome is documented as length of delay, impact on diagnostic timing, stage of disease at time of definitive diagnosis | Study fails to document an outcome relating to the diagnostic pathway | The outcome of the primary care component is required to answer the overarching research question |
| Study is written in English | Study not written in English (where there is no translated version available) | No translation services are available to the authors |
| No study is to be excluded based on geographical location or date of publication | ||