There is a tendency among some health care professionals to suppose that numbers are inherently problematic: they limit, they distort and they somehow imply reductionism. Allegedly, if one uses numbers — for example, as a quantitative researcher — one is inevitably overlooking the essential components: the psychological, the spiritual and the complex social aspects of human life. Here, it is argued that numbers provide a necessary dimension to our way of understanding. The difference between qualitative and quantitative research has nothing to do with the philosophical stance of the researcher. It is simply a matter of different research tools, which are fit for different purposes.
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