Methodological Diversity in Health Care master’s Thesis in Finland: A Pilot Study
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Abstract
Objectives: Master’s level education could strengthen the efforts to sustain and retain professionals in health and social care by providing possibilities of career development. The master’s educations thesis process the students demonstrate their research competence could be one answer to research competence in clinical practice. This research examines what kind of research methods have been used in the master’s level health care education theses in Finland.
Methods: 1056 master’s theses in health care educations in Finland in 2017-2018 were analyzed with the document analysis and categorized as qualitative, quantitative, literature reviews and other methods.
Results: 30% of theses were conducted with qualitative and 12 % with quantitative methods. 6 % were literature reviews while the most were categorized in the other methods (52%).
Conclusions: Results could be partially explained with the context of the study, but at the same time they raise a critical question and need for future research.
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