Guide to writing a health problem statement

Abstract

Introduction: In recent years, Latin American countries have shown an increase in scientific research production, although this growth has not been uniform across all disciplines due to insufficient training and development of research skills among health professionals.

Objective: To provide guidelines for the development of the problem statement, considering the responses of qualified researchers in the field of health.

Materials and Methods: A descriptive qualitative methodology study was carried out through a virtual questionnaire containing an open-ended question. This was answered by eight RENACYT-certified researchers, mostly men, with an average of 6.5 years of experience. The selection was intentional, based on the criterion of accessibility. The data were processed using thematic analysis and with the computational assistance of the RQDA library to identify significant patterns.

Results: The results indicate that six out of the eight generated codes can be used as guidelines for the development of the problem statement (Contextualization, Delimitation, Research Need, Deductive, Knowledge Gap, and Formulation), as they are involved in the action of writing the statement.

Conclusions: Regarding the Guidelines codes, they are considered aspects prior to writing. The implications of the study are discussed, and recommendations for the problem statement in health research are presented.