INTERPRETIVE DESCRIPTION RESEARCH: A FUTILE OR FERTILE VALUE ADD TO NURSING SCIENCE

Abstract

The practice of nursing typically adopts qualitative research approaches to inquire the subjective aspects of patients’ experiences in a situation. However, based on their origins and methodological processes, the approaches merely bring up thick descriptions to understand the phenomenon understudy without intent of problem solving. There is need of nursing specific research approaches that could tackle the notion of holistic care approach in their ontological, epistemological, and methodological processes. Interpretive description is one such, nursing specific, emerging research approach that attempts to address the stated issue. However, the approach is still not acknowledged in research inquiries by nurse researchers in South Asian countries especially Pakistan. This paper will inform the nurse researchers about the basic tenets of interpretive description with analysis of its implications for nursing science.