Factors influencing primary care access, utilisation and quality of management for patients living with hypertension in West Africa: a scoping review protocol.

ABSTRACT

INTRODUCTION: Hypertension, one of the most prevalent non-communicable diseases in West Africa, can be well managed with good primary care. This scoping review will explore what is documented in the literature about factors that influence primary care access, utilisation and quality of management for patients living with hypertension in West Africa. METHODS AND ANALYSIS: The scoping review will employ the approach described by Arksey and O'Malley (2005) . The approach has five stages (1) formulating the research questions, (2) identifying relevant studies, (3) selecting eligible studies, (4) charting the data and (5) collating, summarising and reporting the results. This review will employ the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic review and Meta-Analysis extension for scoping reviews to report the results. PubMed, Embase, Scopus, Cairn Info and Google Scholar will be searched for publications from 1 January 2000 to 31 December 2023. Studies reported in English, French or Portuguese will be considered for inclusion. Research articles, systematic reviews, observational studies and reports that include information on the relevant factors that influence primary care management of hypertension in West Africa will be eligible for inclusion. Study participants should be adults (aged 18 years or older). Clinical case series/case reports, short communications, books, grey literature and conference proceedings will be excluded. Papers on gestational hypertension and pre-eclampsia will be excluded. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION This review does not require ethics approval. Our dissemination strategy includes peer-reviewed publications, policy briefs, presentations at conferences, dissemination to stakeholders and intervention co-production forums.