Reflections on mixed methods from the perspective of the Theory of Praxis Intervention of Nursing in Collective Health

Abstract

Objective: this study aims to present reflections on the development of a methodologically elaborated study with mixed methods in the theoretical perspective of Nursing in collective health. Its philosophical basis is Historical and Dialectical Materialism. The object of the study was the Social Determination of hospitalizations due to Ambulatory-Care Sensitive Conditions of adolescents in a health regional in a southern state of Brazil. Method: descriptive and reflective study, subdivided into three moments. The first deals with the theoretical and methodological foundations, with dialogues between the assumptions of mixed methods and the Theory of Praxis Intervention of Nursing in Public Health. In the second moment, the selection of procedures for the collection of quantitative and qualitative data is described, evidenced by the need to define the combination of these data in the sequence of the process, as well as to establish the weights of the data in the development of the analysis of the phenomenon. In the third moment, the integration of data is reflected, highlighting the combinations of information that occurred in the previous steps, as referred to by the method itself. Result: the study developed using mixed methods enhanced a critical analysis that, anchored in the assumptions of Public Health Nursing, allowed understanding the connections between the quantitative and qualitative data present in the historicity and dynamics of the object. Final considerations: the unprecedented intersection of these theoretical and methodological fields stands out to understand the phenomenon and propose effective actions to face the processes that determine it in its objective reality.