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Qualitative description – the poor cousin of health research?

Open access
Neergaard, Mette Asbjoern, Olesen, Frede, Andersen, Rikke Sand, Sondergaard, Jens·2009·BMC Medical Research Methodology

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The knowledge and use of qualitative description as a qualitative research approach in health services research is limited.The aim of this article is to discuss the potential benefits of a qualitative descriptive approach, to identify its strengths and weaknesses and to provide examples of use. DISCUSSION: Qualitative description is a useful qualitative method in much medical research if you keep the limitations of the approach in mind. It is especially relevant in mixed method research, in questionnaire development and in research projects aiming to gain firsthand knowledge of patients', relatives' or professionals' experiences with a particular topic. Another great advantage of the method is that it is suitable if time or resources are limited. SUMMARY: As a consequence of the growth in qualitative research in the health sciences, researchers sometimes feel obliged to designate their work as phenomenology, grounded theory, ethnography or a narrative study when in fact it is not. Qualitative description might be a useful alternative approach to consider.

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Metadata

Authors
Neergaard, M. A., Olesen, F., Andersen, R. S., & Sondergaard, J.
Venue
BMC Medical Research Methodology
Published
2009-07-16
Volume
9
Issue
1
Pages
52-52
ISSN
1471-2288 (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W2098752671
Cited by
2,072
References
8
FWCI
77.46
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
gold

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CoChat. (2026). Citation check: Qualitative description – the poor cousin of health research? https://app.cochat.ai/papers/10.1186/1471-2288-9-52
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Neergaard, M. A., Olesen, F., Andersen, R. S., & Sondergaard, J. (2009). Qualitative description – the poor cousin of health research? BMC Medical Research Methodology. https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2288-9-52

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Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).

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