Education and debate

How to read a paper: Papers that go beyond numbers (qualitative research)

^a Unit for Evidence-Based Practice and Policy, Department of Primary Care and Population Sciences, University College London Medical School/Royal Free Hospital School of Medicine, Whittington Hospital, London N19 5NF, ^b Exeter and Devon Research and Development Support Unit, Postgraduate Medical School, Wonford, Exeter EX2 5EQ

Correspondence to: Dr Greenhalgh p.greenhalgh@ucl.ac.uk

	What is qualitative research?

Epidemiologist Nick Black has argued that a finding or a result is more likely to be accepted as a fact if it is quantified (expressed in numbers) than if it is not.¹ There is little or no scientific evidence, for example, to support the well known "facts" that one couple in 10 is infertile, or that one man in 10 is homosexual. Yet, observes Black, most of us are happy to accept uncritically such simplified, reductionist, and blatantly incorrect statements so long as they contain at least one number.

Researchers who use qualitative methods seek a deeper truth. They aim to "study things in their natural setting, attempting to make sense of, or interpret, phenomena in terms of the meanings people bring to them,"² and they use "a holistic perspective which preserves the complexities of human behaviour."¹

Box 1: Examples of qualitative research methods

	Evaluating papers that describe qualitative research

Question 1: Did the paper describe an important clinical problem addressed via a clearly formulated question?
Question 2: Was a qualitative approach appropriate?
Question 3: How were the setting and the subjects selected?
Question 4: What was the researcher's perspective, and has this been taken into account?
Question 5: What methods did the researcher use for collecting data—and are these described in enough detail?
Question 6: What methods did the researcher use to analyse the data—and what quality control measures were implemented?
Question 7: Are the results credible, and if so, are they clinically important?
Question 8: What conclusions were drawn, and are they justified by the results?
Question 9: Are the findings of the study transferable to other clinical settings?

	Conclusion

	Acknowledgements

	References

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