Abstract

BackgroundQualitative methods offer a unique contribution to health research. Academic dissertations in the medical field provide an opportunity to explore research practice. Our aim was to assess the use of qualitative methods in dissertations in the medical field.MethodsBy means of a methodological observational study, an analysis of all academic medical dissertations’ abstracts between 1998 and 2018 in a repository databank of a large medical university faculty in Germany was performed. This included MD dissertations (Dr. med. (dent.)) and medical science dissertations (Dr. sc. hum.). All abstracts including “qualitativ*” were screened for studies using qualitative research methods. Data were extracted from abstracts using a category grid considering a) general characteristics (year, language, degree type), b) discipline, c) study design (mixed methods/qualitative only, data conduction, data analysis), d) sample (size and participants) and e) technologies used (data analysis software and recording technology). Thereby reporting quality was assessed.ResultsIn total, 103 abstracts of medical dissertations between 1998 and 2018 (1.4% of N = 7619) were included, 60 of MD dissertations and 43 of medical sciences dissertations. Half of the abstracts (n = 51) referred to dissertations submitted since 2014. Most abstracts related to public health/hygiene (n = 27) and general practice (n = 26), followed by medical psychology (n = 19). About half of the studies (n = 47) used qualitative research methods exclusively, the other half (n = 56) used mixed methods. For data collection, primarily individual interviews were used (n = 80), followed by group interviews (n = 33) and direct observation (n = 11). Patients (n = 36), physicians (n = 36) and healthcare professionals (n = 17) were the most frequent research participants. Incomplete reporting of participants and data analysis was common (n = 67). Nearly half of the abstracts (n = 46) lacked information on how data was analysed, most of the remaining (n = 43) used some form of content analysis. In summary, 36 abstracts provided all crucial data (participants, sample size,; data collection and analysis method).ConclusionA small number of academic dissertations used qualitative research methods. About a third of these reported all key aspects of the methods used in the abstracts. Further research on the quality of choice and reporting of methods for qualitative research in dissertations is recommended.

Highlights

  • Qualitative methods offer a unique contribution to health research

  • Qualitative research methods offer a unique contribution to health research, particular for exploration of the experiences of patients, healthcare professionals and others [1,2,3,4,5]

  • 20 abstracts (12 medicine, 8 medical science) were not further included in the analysis due to an ambiguous and inconclusive use of the label “qualitative methods” and/or restricted comparability with the otherwise pre-dominant interview-based study designs: a) a qualitative research design was stated, but no further information on the approach was given (n = 7), b) no explicit distinction was made between qualitative research design and a clinical diagnostic approach (n = 4), c) the qualitative approach comprised of additional free text answers in written questionnaires only (n = 6), and d) only document analysis or observation was used (n = 3)

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Summary

Introduction

Academic dissertations in the medical field provide an opportunity to explore research practice. Qualitative research methods offer a unique contribution to health research, particular for exploration of the experiences of patients, healthcare professionals and others [1,2,3,4,5]. Methods combining inductive and deductive steps are most suitable for exploratory research questions utilizing existing results, theories and concepts [12]. Given these prospects, little is known on the practice of applying qualitative research methods, especially concerning medicine. Dissertations in medical departments provide a good opportunity to explore research practices of students and young academics. As a by-product, medical doctoral students are increasingly among the authors of published research, holding first-authorship in about 25% [18,19,20]

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