Research supervision is a crucial factor impacting on both the quality of postgraduate education and the efficiency of the higher education system to deliver postgraduate students. The quality of postgraduate supervision, the length of time to complete and the high percentage of learners who terminate their studies are of concern to nursing schools. A systematic review was done as a starting point in developing best practices that are appropriate in the current scenario in postgraduate education. In this paper I will present the findings of a systematic review.

Methods

The review question was “what are best practices in research supervision”. Various data bases were searched in a multi-staged search procedure to identify all scientific studies published in Afrikaans and English, including primary research studies and reviews of research studies. Both quantitative and qualitative research studies were included. All appropriate studies and documents that complied with the selection criteria were then critically appraised using appropriate instruments from Critical Appraisal Skills Programme's (CASP) instruments.

Assessing the applicability of a study in local circumstances occurs continuously and simultaneously with the other steps of the systematic review. The findings of the selected studies were summarised and synthesised as conclusion statements. The strength of the evidence were classified using the guidelines of Minnie, Van der Walt and Klopper (2007).

Discussion

The findings of the systematic review, methodological quality of the study and further research will be discussed.