Patients’ perceptions of maternal healthcare acceptability: A scoping review protocol

Healthcare acceptability is an important concept in health sciences including psychology, yet, it remains controversial and poorly understood by all health researchers. Healthcare acceptability cuts across all health disciplines and refers to human behavioural constructs such as attitude, trust and respect, which are expressed when patients and health professionals interact. Many studies have described the acceptability of maternal healthcare, but there is no universally accepted definition. We describe a protocol for a scoping review of existing literature to shed-light-on the definition and conceptualisation of maternal healthcare acceptability from patients’ perspectives. We will employ a search strategy, with eligibility criteria, to search for relevant articles from electronic and grey literature. Two researchers will independently screen the retrieved articles using Rayyan software and chart data from included articles. An inter-reviewer agreement of 80% will be deemed appropriate. We will interpret key findings in line with available evidence, while being consistent with the research purpose. We will discuss the study’s limitations, implications for practice and propose future research projects.