I've divided this page into two sections. The first provides you with
some
tips on searching for material on Medline, and the second provides
links
to other web resources, including some full text
report
and journal literature.
Searching Medline
Remember that Medline has a Thesaurus of terms - MeSH (Medical Subject Headings), a controlled vocabulary used for indexing articles in Medline. MeSH terminology provides a consistent way to retrieve information where authors may use different terminology for the same concepts.
You will find material on qualitative research in Medline, but you will need to be aware of the thesaurus (MeSH) term used to search for it. You can see this listed in the MeSH database.
MeSH - Qualitative Research
It was introduced into Medline's Thesaurus only in 2003. It sits in the MeSH tree for Empirical Research, another term which was introduced only in 2003.
When you are confronted with a situation where a term is very new you will also have to use your own language to look for articles for the period when this term was not in the thesaurus. With Qualitative Research this is relatively straightforward, as there seem to be few variations used in the literature. Qualitative method* (which would look for qualitative method, or methods, or methodologies, or methodology) would probably cover most of the other options, or you could add Qualitative stud*, to allow for qualitative study, or qualitative studies. Grounded theory can also be searched as a phrase, as there is currently no MeSH heading for this concept. In some circumstances you might also wish to consider other options such as narrative, or descriptive.
Phrase searching in PubMed is described here
Try the following search strategy to find articles on
qualitative research
on health planning
COMBINE
Qualitative Research (MeSH term)
OR
"Qualitative research" (as a phrase)
OR
"Qualitative method*" (as a phrase)
AND
Health Planning (MeSH term)
Planning for needed health and/or welfare services and facilities.
Year introduced: 1979
PubMed Search Formulation
(qualitative research[majr] OR qualitative research OR qualitative
method*
OR qualitative stud*) AND health planning[majr] AND english[lang]
This search strategy uses the heading qualitative research
as
well as qualitative research as a phrase, qualitative method* as
a phrase, and qualitative stud* as a phrase. these are then combined
with health
planning. The section in the square brackets includes majr
-
which focuses the search on articles where the subject is a major issue
in the article. The search is then restricted to English language.
PubMed's default setting is to "explode" all terms, and so
this search
will include the subcategories of health planning listed below.
Health Care Rationing
Health Care Reform
Health Plan Implementation
Health Planning Guidelines
Health Planning Technical Assistance
Health Priorities
Health Resources
Health Services Research
Health Care Surveys
Health Services Needs and Demand
Needs Assessment
Organizational Case Studies
National Health Programs
National Health Insurance, United States
Single-Payer System
Regional Health Planning
Catchment Area (Health)
Certificate of Need
Community Health Planning
Health Facility Planning +
Health Systems Plans
Medically Underserved Area
Regional Medical Programs
State Health Plans
Click here to see how it works. PubMed
Search.
There are many other databases where you will find material on
qualitative
research. Consider Academic Search Premier, CINAHL, Academic
OneFile,
Health Source: Nursing, PsycINFO, and Sociofile for a start. These and
other databases of interest are listed on my databases
page.
Other Web Resources
bmj.com
Collected Resources : Qualitative Research: descriptions
bmj.com
Collected Resources : Qualitative Research: examples
Cochrane
Qualitative Research Methods Group
The central concerns of the group relate to increasing an awareness of the role of qualitative evidence in guiding health care practices; the development of approaches suitable for systematically reviewing qualitative evidence; and the training of reviewers in qualitative meta-synthesis.
Google
Directory : Grounded
Theory
How to read a paper: Papers that go beyond numbers (qualitative research)
By Trisha Greenhalgh and Rod Taylor R
BMJ Sept 1997, 315 (7110): 740-3
 Integrative Approaches to Qualitative and Quantitative Evidence
By Mary Dixon-Woods, Shona Agarwal, Bridget Young, David Jones, and Alex Sutton. Health Development Agency, UK, 2004. This report is an informal review of the literature on integrating qualitative and quantitative forms of evidence.
Intute: Social Sciences - browse Qualitative Methods
Intute is a free online service providing access to the very best web resources for education and research. The service is created by a network of UK universities and partners.
Qualitative
Methods in Health Research
The Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research sponsored a
workshop
on September 30 and October 1, 1999, entitled Qualitative Methods in
Health
Research: Opportunities and Considerations in Application and Review.
The
workshop was organized by the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH)
Culture
and Qualitative Research Interest Group 1 and was supported by the
National
Institute of Mental Health and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse
and Alcoholism.
The Qualitative
Report
- Qualitative Research Web Sites
This page is maintained by Ronald J. Chenail, The Office for Academic
Affairs Nova Southeastern University.
Quality in Qualitative Evaluation: A Framework for Assessing Research Evidence
By Liz Spencer, Jane Ritchie, Jane Lewis, and Lucy Dillon, National Centre for Social Research. Government Chief Social Researcher's Office, Cabinet Office, August 2003.
A
User's Guide to Qualitative Research in Health Care
Mita
Giacomini,
Deborah J. Cook, for the Evidence Based Medicine Working Group.
Based on the
Users'
Guides to Evidence-based Medicine and reproduced with permission from
JAMA.
(2000 Jul 26;284(4):478-82)
Using Qualitative Research in Systematic Reviews: Older people's views of hospital discharge
Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE), February 2006. In this report SCIE uses the example of older people’s views on discharge from hospital to provide a worked example of combining findings from qualitative studies and draws out key messages for systematic reviewing.
How Knowledge Works in Social Care, No. 9.
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