Table 1 In-depth interview guide

1. Disease labelling and symptoms; Appraisal stage

(a) Please tell me about the illness you have which is now known to be cervical cancer.

(i) What were the first symptoms at onset of the illness?

(b) What did the symptoms mean to you?

(i) Did the symptoms mean a serious disease or just some common disease that did not require immediate action?

(c) What did you do when you recognized these symptoms?

(i) Did you talk to somebody about your symptoms?

(ii) Who were these others you consulted?

(iii) What were you told about the symptoms in terms of causes, consequences and management?

2. Considered consequences of the disease; Illness stage

(a) What made you feel that you needed to seek care out of your home?

(i) Where did you first go to seek care with these symptoms?

(ii) Why did you go there?

(iii) Where else did you go for treatment?

(b) How was the decision made?

(i) Who were involved in the decision making process on seeking care?

(ii) What were considered? – including severity, availability of money, previous experience with the disease.

3. Behavioural stage

(a) From the time you recognized that the symptoms were serious enough and needed visiting a health worker

(i) How long did you take to go to the hospital?

(ii) Why did you take the time you took?

(b) Were you referred to this hospital? How long did it take you to come to this hospital from that time of referral?

(c) Why did it take you that time?

4. Diagnostic stage

(a) When you came to this hospital, how long did it take to have the result of the test for cancer back?

(b) Why did it take the time it took for you to receive the result?

5. Curability; Treatment stage

(a) After receiving your cancer result, how long did it take you to receive the needed treatment?

(i) Tell us the time in days or weeks or months that passed from time you got cancer result to time when you got treatment you think was for treating the cancer itself.

(b) Do you think that this kind of cancer can get cured?

(i) If you think it can get cured (or cannot cure), why do you think so?