OBJECTIVE To provide practical strategies for conducting and evaluating analyses of qualitative data applicable for health services researchers. DATA SOURCES AND DESIGN: We draw on extant qualitative methodological literature to describe practical approaches to qualitative data analysis. Approaches to data analysis vary by discipline and analytic tradition; however, we focus on qualitative data...

Although qualitative studies have increased since the 1990s, some reports note that relatively few influential journals published them up until 2000. This study critically reviewed the characteristics of qualitative studies published in top tier medical journals since 2000. We assessed full texts of qualitative studies published between 2000 and 2004 in the Annals of Internal Medicine, BMJ, JAM...

Interpreting results of qualitative research has been regarded by many as difficult fraught with accommodating multiple points of view in complex problem domains. It is recognised (Denzin & Lincoln, 2000) that there is no clear or straightforward solution to interpret qualitative research results. In this paper, sense-making conceptual models (SCMs) are explored as both a generic and an individ...

BACKGROUND Depression is common in Parkinson's disease (PD); in light of typical PD pathology it may differ phenomenologically from depression in the general population. OBJECTIVE To assess depressive symptoms in PD patients and control groups and compare symptom profiles. METHODS After postal screening of 10,000 citizens of Lübeck, 642 participants were examined and the Beck Depression Inv...

BACKGROUND Frontotemporal dementia (FTD) and Alzheimer's disease are clinically distinct disorders, yet neuropsychological studies have had variable success in distinguishing them. A possible reason is that studies typically rely on overall accuracy scores, which may obscure differences in reasons for failure. OBJECTIVES To explore the hypothesis that analysis of qualitative performance chara...