Background General practice research in China needs to further explore the path for breaking through the bottleneck of the discipline development from the perspective of philosophy and methodology.
Objective By comparing and analyzing qualitative research articles published in benchmark journals, strategies for further advocating qualitative research in general practice medicine in China are proposed.
Methods Based on a brief analysis of the categories and topics research articles published in the British Journal of General Practice, the author reflects on the current relevant publications and challenges of qualitative research in medical discipline and proposes strategies to promote qualitative research in general practice.
Results Qualitative research in the British Journal of General Practice accounts for 38% (41/107) of research articles in 2024. The people-centred orientation of general practice encourages researchers to explore experiences, views, perceptions and opinions of patients, laypersons, doctors, nurses, and stakeholders, to plan and provide primary care that with humanity, responsiveness, and participatory. Social science methodologists and academic general practitioners who are interested in sociological research methods are the main driving force for the application of qualitative research in the field of general practice. The tradition of biomedicine philosophy with positivism is a disciplinary barrier that medical-trained need to overcome when conducting qualitative research. Academic general practitioners must understand the difference between ontology and epistemology, and acknowledge and try the interpretivist way of thinking. Different from qualitative data collection and coding techniques that are relatively easy to learn, during the training and learning process of qualitative research, special attention should be paid to breaking through the inertia of thinking and using interpretivism as another window to understand the world and primary care.
Conclusion Qualitative research is an important area for the development of general practice disciplines. Better quality qualitative research first depends on the enrichment of philosophical thoughts and then use the tools and tactics to realize another understanding of the world.
