CASE STUDY APPROACHES IN NURSING RESEARCH

Abstract

Case studies have been used into social sciences and health disciplines because of their properties to understand complex phenomena in a variety of contexts and situations. However, its use has been confusing because of the different researcher’s perspectives. This article aims to distinguish two types of two types of case studies approaches: the one with a qualitative perspective and as a design research strategy. The qualitative case study are originated by the particular way of seing the case as a whole: its contexts and limits, intensive case analysis or collective cases, and always under the conception of their idiosyncrasy without generalization. In a research design, case study is a research strategy that tries to answer a research question by applying different methods for data collection and analyzing by using constant comparison. Currently, both approaches of case studies are used by researchers, having a potential benefit for nursing and health settings and contexts.