Grounded Theory

Purpose/Objectives: To develop a better understanding of how older adult survivors of early-stage breast and prostate cancer managed the work of recovery.

Research Approach: Multiple case study design embedded in a larger randomized, controlled trial of a nurse-led patient navigation intervention.

Setting: Community-based research conducted via in-home visits and by phone with participants residing in non-metropolitan areas of a mid-Atlantic state.

OBJECTIVE: To construct a substantive theory of postpartum fatigue. DESIGN: Grounded theory. SETTING: Participants were recruited in the hospital after delivery and interviewed in their homes. PARTICIPANTS: Thirteen primiparae (n=5) and multiparae (n=8) women between 2 and 5 weeks postpartum from diverse ethnic, age, obstetric, and financial contexts were theoretically sampled. RESULTS: Persevering was the central human process around which the grounded theory emerged.

Although the grounded theory method was not designed with nursing science in mind, it is one of the most prevalent and theory-producing qualitative methods in nursing. Changes in the grounded theory methodology have been debated in numerous articles. What has not received much attention, however, is a central idea of the grounded theory method - the basic social process.