Assessing the Quality of Qualitative Research in Nursing: A Study on Parental Perceptions of Child Vaccination in Singapore

Research Methodology in Nursing
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Part 1: Assessing the quality of qualitative research
Question 1: Study Purpose/Question
(a) Did the study have a clearly stated purpose/research question?
Yes
(b) Explain your response below:
At the end of the introduction and background section, purpose of the was clearly
mentioned. Purpose of the study was mentioned after through literature survey. From the
literature survey, it was evident that parental views were not explore on their children’s
vaccination. Hence, purpose of this study was to explore the perceptions of parents on
their child’s vaccination in Singapore to identify gaps in current healthcare practice and
therefore help develop future programmes to improve parents’ experiences regarding their
children’s vaccination (Kurup et al., 2017).
Question 2: Relevance to nursing/midwifery practice
(a) Explain how this question was relevant to nursing/midwifery practice.
Interaction of nurse with parents during immunization and for immunization of children is
crucial aspect. Nurse can play significant role in improving parent’s perception for
adherence to immunization and influencing others for immunization. Nurse can reduce
parents anxiety while delivering painful injection to their children and educating them and
improving their knowledge about the immunization (Holland, 2014).
Question 3: Ethics
(a) What were the possible risks of participating in the study?
Parents perceptions like effect of vaccination on their child’s growth, issues related to
vaccination, past negative experiences and religious beliefs were the risks associated with
parents for the participation in the study (Kurup et al., 2017).
(b) Were these risks clearly identified by the authors?
Yes
(c) If risks were identified by the authors, how did they propose to minimise risk?
Risk minimisation strategy was not mentioned for the all the risks. Risk minimisation
strategy was mentioned only for risk like issues related to vaccination. Most of the
children might face problem during vaccination. Child might feel pain and might cry
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during vaccination. Authors suggested strategies to reduce risks. Strategies to minimize
risk mentioned by the authors can be considered as valid strategies because these were
mentioned with relevant literature support. Pain during vaccination can be reduced by
using distraction techniques. Moreover, authors also suggested use of topical anaesthetics
for pain management. However, there was no standardised anaesthetic is available for use
during immunization (Kurup et al., 2017).
(d) Did the authors state that they had approval from an ethics committee to undertake the
study?
Yes
(e) How did the authors obtain informed consent from participants?
Written consent was obtained from the participants for voluntary participation and
confidentiality of data. This written consent was taken individually after providing
information related to study both in verbal and written format (Kurup et al., 2017).
(f) Did you identify and potential risks associated with the study that were not identified by
the authors and if so, what were they?
There were no identified potential risks other than identified by the author.
Question 4: Study Methodology
(a) What the chosen methodology for this study?
Descriptive qualitative method was employed in this study. Descriptive study can be helpful in the
describing the health-care and nursing related phenomenon. Qualitative research designs are being
used widely for the gaining insights of the poorly understood phenomenon (Gray et al., 2013).
Descriptive qualitative method can be useful for obtaining information in the form of description
and in the form of interviews or questionnaires. In this type of descriptive qualitative analysis,
usually thematic analysis being used. In this study, also thematic analysis was being used.
However, care should be taken that it should get confused with the content analysis (Chesnay,
2014).
(b) Was this choice suitable for the given research problem/question?
Yes
(c) Explain your response to (b):
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Qualitative research methods are being used for the comprehensive summation of the
experience of the people related to particular phenomenon. Information related to patient
experience can be gathered either through observation or interview. In this research study,
information related to parent’s perception about their children’s immunization need to
collected. This information was collected by conducting interviews of parents in person
and through telephone. Moreover, this research method can fulfil the aim of the study.
Hence, this research methodology is suitable for this research study (Morris, 2015; Bell,
2014).
Question 5: Data Collection/Rigour
(a) Describe how the data was collected for this study (interview, observation, etc).
In descriptive qualitative studies, data can be collected through different methods like interview
using interview guide, surveys, observations and filed notes. In this study, data was collected
through interview using interview guide. Suitability of the interview and interview guide was
confirmed by carrying out pilot study. There were two types of interviews like structured and semi-
structured in which closed and open questions can be asked. In open questions, fixed information
can be obtained and in closed questions, variable information can be collected based on the
individual participant. Both structured and semi-structured interviews can be used effectively for
collection of data in qualitative research (Fisher, 2011). In this study, semi-structured interview
was conducted. In this study, both face-to-face and telephone interviews being used. Each
interview process was lasted for about 10-30 minutes. These interviews were audio-recorded.
These audio-records of the interview can be useful in demonstrating more details of interview,
accurate analysis and monitoring of the interview process. Moreover, these audio-records can be
achieved for later reference. Outcome of the interview based qualitative study based on the
sampling of the participants because participants need to express their feelings and experiences.
Content of the interview is important aspect because it should align with the aim and purpose of the
study and outcome of the study also based on the content of the interview questions. Content which
is interview guide in this study can be considered as robust and valid resource because it was
developed based on the literature and two experts opinion were taken. However, details of the
experts like expertise and experience were not mentioned in this study (Morris, 2015; Erlingsson &
Brysiewicz, 2013).
In interview based data collection, accurate demographic data can be collected because participants
can not give false data related to age and gender. In interview based data collection both verbal and
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