Establishing Trustworthiness in Health Care Process Modelling: A Practical Guide to Quality Enhancement in Studies Using the Functional Resonance Analysis Method

Abstract

The Functional Resonance Analysis Method (FRAM) is a novel healthcare research methodology that has increasingly been applied in the healthcare domain. The method has an ability to map and model everyday healthcare activities and their interdependencies, as well as, demonstrate how variability can emerge and impact system outcomes. To build a FRAM model, researchers gather data from key stakeholders, such as health care workers and patients and their families using qualitative data collection methods. An important consideration for researchers using the FRAM is how they will establish trustworthiness in their study findings given the data used to build and analyze a FRAM model can be subjective. In the spirit of advancing the quality of qualitative research, the aim of this paper is to provide practical guidance to researchers on how to employ quality enhancement criteria and strategies in their qualitative research efforts so that the resulting FRAM models and insights afforded by them are trustworthy.