The global dissemination of qualitative nursing research methods

Social science research is in the midst of an enormous methodological transition, adding to, and expanding our abilities and capabilities as researchers. In the past three decades, qualitative methods have transitioned from anthropology and sociology into the applied disciplines-particularly, into education and health care. This transition is expanding nursing's repertoire of research methods, and enabling nurse researchers to get inside the illness experience and the processes of providing care. In nursing, qualitative methods provide us with the abilities to elicit the individuals' experiences, and to recognize patterns of experiences of illness, care and recovering health.

The issue discussed here concerns us all: How are qualitative methods disseminated globally? How do those researchers with the barriers of language, distant programs, lacking mentors and research methods courses, manage to access the information needed to gain expertise in qualitative methods? Here, I explore the modes of global dissemination of qualitative inquiry, as we work towards establishing a global community for nursing research. [Publisher's Text].