Registration
This study protocol has been registered under the INPLASY registry with the registration number INPLASY202150039. The review will be done following the reporting standards suggested in the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) statement.
Eligibility Criteria
The research question was performed by identifying the type of evidence needed to answer the question. The strategy uses domain, determinant, and outcome (DDO) format in the study. DDO format will be used to obtain relevant answers and to identify the question, and concentrate the mind.
The domain will be the “COVID-19”. The determinant is an “assessment” OR “questionnaire” OR “survey”. The outcomes will be “knowledge” OR “attitude” OR “practice”.
The searching procedure will be conducted using bibliographic databases and other evidence sources to address the review question. The procedure of a comprehensive literature search will be looking at the eligibility articles, searching strategy for identification of studies, study selection, and data extraction.
The studies that do not meet the specific inclusion criteria for this study will be eliminated. The inclusion criteria in this study are research articles and case reports, human studies, English language, and articles published from December 2019 to January 2021. The exclusion criteria are review articles, in vivo or in vitro studies, other languages, non-free full-text articles. This systematic review will consider the only cross-sectional study of good quality.
Search Strategy for Identification of Studies
The search strategy aims to obtain published articles only. The process of searching strategy for identification of studies will include all published studies. It involved a three-stage protocol (Figure 1). The first stage will be followed by an analysis of the text words contained in the titles and abstracts and of the index terms used to describe each article. In the second stage, a Boolean search will be conducted using the identified keywords of the selected databases. In the third stage, the reference lists of key articles will be searched for additional studies.
Published articles
The published articles referring to any article have been published in peer-reviewed indexed journals. The first step is to locate the published articles for this research using computer-based information search. The established databases to be searched in this review will be WHO COVID-19, Science Direct, Scopus, PubMed, MEDLINE, and EMBASE.
Boolean search will be performed on each database using the search term: “COVID-19” AND (“assessment” OR “questionnaire” OR “survey”) AND (“knowledge” OR “attitude” OR “practice”). The published literature will be carefully searched for this study. An initial limited search of WHO COVID-19, Science Direct, Scopus, PubMed, MEDLINE, and EMBASE databases will be undertaken.
Screening Title and Abstract
Study screening and selection of potentially eligible studies will be conducted by at least two independent researchers. Titles and abstracts of studies retrieved using the abovementioned search strategy will be downloaded into the reference manager tool, Endnote software. When all researchers agreed on a suitable title and abstract, the full-text of the article will be retrieved. Duplicated articles will be deleted.
Obtaining Full-text Published Articles Studies
All published articles will be searched. Full-text articles will be obtained and downloaded from the established resources (WHO COVID-19, Science Direct, Scopus, PubMed, MEDLINE, and EMBASE) with a search term. Articles searched in this study were only obtained in a free article. The articles without full text will be excluded from the study.
Selecting Suitable of Full-text Published Articles
The process of selecting suitable full-text published articles will be done and selected by the three reviewers who expert in methodology and topic under review. An agreement of inclusion and exclusion criteria will be made before starting the review process. It will be reported using PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) flow diagram (18). Then, valid articles will be assessed for their quality before retrieving information. Any disagreements between the reviewers will be resolved through discussion and consideration to the fourth reviewer.
Critical Appraisal
Three independent researchers will perform the critical appraisal to assess study quality and minimise bias. Most methods encompass issues such as appropriateness of study design to the research objective. The articles which do not fulfil the and poor-quality studies will be excluded or discussed in detail. The methodological quality of the studies will be assessed using the Strengthening the Reporting of Observational Studies in Epidemiology (STROBE) for a cross-sectional study. Any disagreements between the reviewers will be resolved through discussion and consideration to the fourth reviewer.
Data extraction
Two independent researchers will perform data extraction to establish inter-rater reliability and avoid data entry errors. Study context factors of published articles will include the information describing the study and its subjects. Reported findings of the remaining studies will be extracted onto a data extraction form. Lists of included studies will be then created. Data extraction will be independently cross-checked.
Data Management
All relevant articles will be manually coded in the spreadsheets and described in evidence tables. The electronic spreadsheets will be utilised to import the data into excel form for data analysis.
Outcome measures
The outcome measures reported in studies meeting the inclusion criteria will be grouped under the following headings: country, questionnaire items, study population, language, number of items in each domain (knowledge, attitude, and practice), and the validity and reliability of each domain.
ANALYSIS
Descriptive analysis
A narrative synthesis of the outcomes of the selected studies will be presented in the final review. This will include the following: the country where the study conducted, questionnaires items, study population, language used in the questionnaire, number of items in each domain (knowledge, attitude, and practice), and the validity and reliability of each domain.
Statistical Analysis
We are interested in the assessment of the knowledge, attitude, and practice on COVID-19 infection. Data will be analysed using descriptive statistics. The numerical outcomes will be analysed using mean and standard deviation. The categorical outcomes will be analysed using frequency and percentage. The statistical analysis will be performed using Statistical Package of Social Science Version 27.