Quality of Work
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Q Wave Myocardial Infarction ▶ Acute Myocardial Infarction
qEEG ▶ Quantitative EEG Including the Five Common Bandwidths (Delta, Theta, Alpha, Sigma, and Beta)
QTL ▶ Quantitative Trait Locus (QTL)
Qualitative Research Methods J. Rick Turner Cardiovascular Safety, Quintiles, Durham, NC, USA
Definition Qualitative research methods collect and analyze qualitative data, which are often expressed in words rather than numbers. Qualitative data can be distinguished from quantitative data, which are expressed in numbers (e.g., a systolic blood pressure of 120 millimeters of mercury [mmHg]).
One example of a qualitative characteristic is skin coloration (at least as traditionally described). While normal skin colors vary from pinkish white to black, medical conditions and diseases can cause alterations of an individual’s skin color. Anemia can lead to a white color (in those not normally so white). Various inflammations can lead to a red color (e.g., a severe rash), and cyanosis resulting from cardiac failure or lung failure leads to a blue color. Such assessments are not recorded and reported in numbers but in descriptive text. Some researchers regard categorical data as qualitative data, even though numerical representations do occur when presenting the data. Consider the variables sex and blood group. Each of us falls into a mutually exclusive category for each one, e.g., male or female, and O, A, B, and AB. None of us falls into more than one category in each case. Additionally, there is no order to the categories: blood group B neither comes before or after blood group O. In a group of individuals of interest, data could be presented as counts of the number of individuals falling into each category in each case, thereby using numbers. There are categories that can be ordered. For example, ordered categories of a pain that is experienced would be mild, moderate, and severe. Again, for a group of individuals of interest (perhaps subjects undergoing mindful meditation therapy or another behavioral intervention for pain), it is possible to describe how many individuals reported a pain falling in each of the categories.
M.D. Gellman & J.R. Turner (eds.), Encyclopedia of Behavioral Medicine, DOI 10.1007/978-1-4419-1005-9, # Springer Science+Business Media New York 2013
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Cross-References ▶ Data
References and Readings Piantadosi, S. (2005). Clinical trials: A methodologic perspective (2nd ed.). Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Interscience.
Quality of Care ▶ Doctor-Patient Communication: Why and How Communication Contributes to the Quality of Medical Care
Quality of Life Maartje de Wit and Tibor Hajos Medical Psychology, VU University Medical Center, Amsterdam, North Holland, The Netherlands
Synonyms
Quality of Care
researchers (e.g., functional status is sometimes used as a measure of QoL by health researchers). The first type of definitions has been researched since Aristotle, and still no consensus has been reached on how to define happiness and how to measure it (Fayers & Machin, 2000). The second and third types of de
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