In the Face of Critique: A Metasynthesis of the Experiences of Journalists Covering Health and Science

The qualitative literature related to health and science journalism often states that little is known about the perspectives of journalists. This is, in part, because of individual studies being like scattered pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. In this article, the authors report the results of a qualitative metasynthesis aimed at reassembling the qualitative literature involving health and science journalists. Comprehensive literature searches gave a data set of 21 studies whose synthesis produced 14 metathemes and four taxonomic groupings. This synthesis is used to show the state of qualitative knowledge and the potential for future research.