Table 1 Stages of nominal group technique (adapted from Potter et al. [23])

1. Introduction and explanation

This stage provides an overview and purpose of the meeting to the participants and presents the questions that will be asked during the meeting

Participants were sent an email two days prior to the NGT taking place. The email contained an outline of the structure of the NGT, what online system was being used, what they needed to bring (a device either a laptop or phone to access Poll Everywhere) and the three questions that would be asked during the session

2. Silent generation of ideas

The questions are posed to the participants and they have time to write down all their ideas/responses. It is important in this stage that participants do not discuss or consult other participants with their ideas

The three questions were asked one by one and participants were given five minutes per question to submit their answers. Answers were captured via Poll Everywhere. Participants could submit their responses via a webpage or by text

3. Sharing ideas

Participants are asked to share their ideas they have written down in stage 2. All ideas are written down and there is no discussion or debate between the participants during this stage

For this study stage 2 and 3 occurred simultaneously. The responses were displayed instantly on an overhead projector so all participants could see the responses in real time. However, all participants were asked not to discuss what was displayed on the screen until the next stage. Instead the participants were encouraged to send further responses to Poll Everywhere

4. Group discussions

In this stage participants can discuss the ideas presented and seek further clarification. New ideas can be suggested but no ideas from the previous stages should be eliminated

Once all three questions were posed to the group and responses for the questions were collected, participants completed discussions in groups of four to five people. Participants were asked to discuss their responses and the responses from the group for each question. One person in the group was the scribe and they recorded key points of the discussions on an iPad

5. Voting and ranking

This stage involves prioritizing and ranking the ideas from the above stages. Discussions and group ranking can occur, or all participants can rank ideas separately

This stage was not included in this study