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Objective: Grounded theory (GT) is an established qualitative research method, but few papers have encapsulated the benefits, limits, and basic tenets of doing GT research on user and provider experiences of health care services. GT can be used to guide the entire study method, or it can be applied at the data analysis stage only., Methods: We summarize key components of GT and common GT procedures used by qualitative researchers in health care research. We draw on our experience of conducting a GT study on amyotrophic lateral sclerosis patients' experiences of health care services., Findings: We discuss why some approaches in GT research may work better than others, particularly when the focus of study is hard-to-reach population groups. We highlight the flexibility of procedures in GT to build theory about how people engage with health care services., Conclusion: GT enables researchers to capture and understand health care experiences. GT methods are particularly valuable when the topic of interest has not previously been studied. GT can be applied to bring structure and rigor to the analysis of qualitative data., (© Health Research and Educational Trust.)

Background: Patients in receipt of palliative care services are often viewed primarily as recipients of support from their family caregiver. There is a dearth of evidence in palliative care on what comprises mutual support between patients and their family caregivers in palliative care. Aim: To identify processes of mutual support between patients and family caregivers in palliative care. Design: Qualitative study comprising semi-structured interviews. Data were analysed using grounded theory procedures. Setting/participants: Fifteen patients with advanced illness (cancer n = 14, neurodegenerative n = 1) and 21 family caregivers recruited from a large regional-based hospice. Results: Mutual support between patients and family caregivers comprised two primary modes in which support was provided and received. Mutual support involved both patients and family caregivers providing similar types of support to each other, and which typically manifested as emotional support. However, mutual support also occurred when patients reciprocated by providing emotional support to their family caregivers to compensate for other forms of support which they felt no longer able to provide. Patients supported family caregivers by involving them in decision-making for care and both patient and family caregiver preferences were influenced by obligation to their respective other. Mutual support comprised both disclosure and concealment. Involving family caregivers in patient care decision-making was intended by patients to help family caregivers adjust to a caregiving role. Conclusions: The findings inform the development and delivery of psychosocial interventions for patients and family caregivers in palliative care aimed at facilitating supportive relations between them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interviewing is a frequently deployed data collection method in grounded theory research. Theoretical sampling is a core feature of the grounded theory method. Theoretical sampling is commonly understood as a means for sampling participants with a set of theoretical considerations in mind. However, theoretical sampling also occurs in the actual data generating process, for example through interviewing. Here, we illustrate how interviewing can be used as a vehicle for theoretical sampling. We discuss how to set up an interview study for it to be amenable to theoretical sampling. We show how interviewing and theoretical sampling align as the study proceeds and how interviewing in grounded theory can steer the course for theoretical sampling. We demonstrate how co-construction of data in grounded theory interviewing fuels theoretical sampling. Finally, we show that proceeding with questions for the purpose of theoretical sampling requires reflexivity and flexibility on the part of the researcher. We conclude that generating and analyzing data through the course of interviewing allows the researcher to probe into, expand on, and saturate key concepts and categories which collectively steer the inquiry and subsequent sampling. In the absence of theoretical sampling, it is not possible to grasp the basis for modifying interview questions or to decipher what or how questions should be asked, and for what purpose. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Theoretical sampling is a key procedure for theory building in the grounded theory method. Confusion about how to employ theoretical sampling in grounded theory can exist among researchers who use or who want to use the grounded theory method. We illustrate how we employed theoretical sampling in diverse grounded theory studies and answer key questions about theoretical sampling in grounded theory. We show how theoretical sampling functions in grounded theory and how it differs from sampling for data generation alone. We demonstrate how induction, retroduction, and abduction operate in grounded theory and how memoing drives theoretical sampling in the pursuit of theory. We explicate how theoretical sampling can contextualize data to build concepts and theory. Finally, we show how theoretical sampling in grounded theory operates in secondary analysis to derive theory that goes beyond the original purpose of data collection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The grounded theory (GT) method is widely applied, yet frequently misunderstood. We outline the main variants of GT and dispel the most common myths associated with GT. We argue that the different variants of GT incorporate a core set of shared procedures that can be put to work by any researcher or team from their chosen ontological and epistemological perspective. This "shared core" of the GT method is articulated as the principles of (1) taking the word "grounded" seriously, (2) capturing and explaining context-related social processes, (3) pursuing theory through engagement with data, and (4) pursuing theory through theoretical sampling. In this article, we have put forward, in a nutshell, a distillation of core principles underpinning existing GT approaches that can aid further engagement with the different variants of GT. We are motivated by the wish to make GT more comprehensible and accessible, especially for researchers who are new to the method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses a study regarding psycho-social processes, which underpin the engagement of motor neurone disease (MND) patients with healthcare services. Topics include the use of grounded theory approach with in-depth qualitative interviews, the investigation of researchers on the perceptions of healthcare services among MND patients, and the role of life-sustaining treatments.

Abstract: People with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) engage with a broad range of health care services from symptom onset to end-of-life care. We undertook a grounded theory study to identify processes that underpin how and why people with ALS engage with health care services. Using theoretical sampling procedures, we sampled 34 people from the Irish ALS population-based register during September 2011 to August 2012. We conducted in-depth interviews with participants about their experiences of health care services. Our study yielded new insights into how people with ALS engage with services and adapt to loss. People with ALS live with insurmountable loss and never regain what they have already lost. Loss for people with ALS is multidimensional and includes loss of control. The experience of loss of control prompts people with ALS to search for control over health care services but exerting control in health care services can also include rendering control to service providers. People with ALS negotiate loss by exerting control over and rendering control to health care services. Our findings are important for future research that is attuned to how people with terminal illness exert control in health care services and make decisions about care in the context of mounting loss. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Patients and informal caregivers in palliative care can reciprocate in supporting one another. However, how reciprocal support among patients and informal caregivers in palliative care impacts on their decision making for care is not well understood. To identify how reciprocal support among patients with advanced illness and their informal caregivers in specialist palliative care impacts on their decision making for care. Between July 2021 and May 2022, 30 qualitative interviews were conducted with 14 patient and caregiver dyads, seven nondyad caregiver participants and one nondyad patient participant (total n = 36), recruited from a large regional specialist palliative care service. Data were analyzed using Corbin and Strauss grounded theory method. Reciprocal support among patients and informal caregivers was underpinned by obligation and choice. Caregivers who felt obliged to care had difficulty communicating with the patient about the patient's preferences for care and their own wishes for patient care. Patients who felt obliged to accept support from their caregiver tended to minimize caregiver participation in decision making which made caregivers feel disempowered in discussions about patient care. Caregivers tended to be more involved in decision making when caregivers assumed caregiving duties by choice and when the patient did not feel restricted by their reliance on their caregiver. Open communication between patients and caregivers made patients more trusting of their caregiver. Patient and caregiver dyadic interventions in specialist palliative care involving decision making need to account for how obligation and choice manifest and function between the patient and caregiver. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]