2 METHODOLOGY
A descriptive cross-sectional survey design was employed to assess the
L-Asparaginase usage practice among healthcare providers treating
children with cancer in India. The survey was conducted through the
smart survey platform. Firstly, the researchers sent an email invite to
all the potential participants associated with the study. The
researchers sent fortnightly reminders to the participants during the
data collection process to minimise the non-responses. Data collected
through this platform was digitally stored in a designated device as an
encrypted file. The data was transferred and securely stored in a hard
drive upon completing the data collection process.
The researchers have designed a three-part survey containing 25
questions to collect data from study participants. The first part
consisted of information about the survey and consent. The second part
included five questions to capture the demographic details of the survey
participant, and the last part had 20 questions aimed to assess the
Asparaginase usage practices of the respondents. Out of the 20 core
questions, 14 were multiple choice questions, and the remaining six were
dichotomous questions. A pilot survey on five pediatric oncologists was
implemented to check content validity and comprehensibility, of the
questionnaire, the results of which was excluded from the present data
analysis.
The participant’s responses to the survey questionnaire were recorded on
Microsoft Excel 2016 and quantitatively analysed using IBM SPSS 16.0.
Descriptive statistics were implemented in the present study. The
Institutional Ethics Committee
(IEC), Kasturba Hospital and
Kasturba Medical College, Manipal (IEC 532/2020) approved the study
protocol.