[Quantity versus quality: a review on current methodological dispute in health services research].

OBJECTIVE

The aim of this study was to determine the percentage of qualitative and quantitative research papers on health services research in two German journals.

METHODS

All publications of the two journals were viewed. Only empirical research papers were included. It was then assessed whether they dealt with health services research and what methodology was used to collect and analyse data.

RESULTS

About half of all published empirical papers dealt with health services research. Of those, slightly over 20 % used qualitative methods at least partially. Ordered by topic, qualitative data collection and analysis is especially common in the fields of phenomenology, treatment determinants and treatment outcome.

CONCLUSIONS

Sole qualitative methodology is still used rather seldom in health services research. Attempts to include quantitative as well as qualitative approaches are limited to sequential design, lowering the independent value of both approaches. The concept of triangulation yields the possibility to overcome paradigm based dichotomies. However, the choice of methodology ought to be based primarily on the research question.