Influencing practice or simply esoteric? Researching health care using postmodern approaches

Increasingly, contemporary health literature has begun to explore the poten tial of postmodern approaches to enable new and different analyses of healt h care practice. Paradoxically, as the use of postmodern approaches has inc reased, so has the lack of clarity with respect to what constitutes a postm odern approach. Challenges to postmodern approaches to research have come f rom those who argue that they contribute nothing to either the understandin g of the reality of health care or the improvement oft he delivery of healt h care services. This article will explore what postmodern research approac hes are and use examples of research to illustrate how such approaches can inform understandings of health and health cave practice, thereby opening u p possibilities for change. It is designed to encourage people with an inte rest in post modem approaches to undertake research that has clear applicab ility to, and influence on, health cave practice.