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‘Not everything that can be counted counts and not everything that counts can be counted’ (attributed to Albert Einstein)

Why do people experience pain differently? Qualitative research focuses on experience that we cannot count. It is underpinned by an understanding that the experience of illness is much more than biomedical findings. Qualitative research aims to help us to understand what it is like to be someone else and can allow us to sit alongside our patients (sometimes without fixing). In this way, qualitative research can contribute to a collaborative patient–clinician partnership. This partnership frames the clinician as an advocate and thus has the potential to be equally rewarding for both parties. Qualitative research also aims to challenge our prevailing understanding and to encourage us to ask questions; the world is not always as it appears. This special qualitative edition of the British Journal of Pain provides insight into the experience of pain from a broad range of qualitative approaches. It does not aim to be comprehensive but to encourage readers to explore what qualitative research can add to our understanding of pain, and to spark interest in qualitative research methods. 
 
To start this edition, Frank’s seminal paper explores the central place of people’s stories in the experience and treatment of pain. Morse then gives examples of how qualitative research can be used to delve beneath the superficial to find out what is really going on. Gooberman-Hill gives an insight into the usefulness of ethnography for understanding pain. Seers outlines how qualitative systematic review can help us to understand what it is like to live with pain. Smith and Osborn’s paper exploring the experience of chronic pain highlights a sobering thought that certain facets of patients’ experience have not changed qualitatively since 1998, namely, some patients with chronic pain still do not feel believed. Ziebland, Lavie-Ajayi and Lucius-Hoene demonstrate how people living with chronic pain can access qualitative findings via the Internet to help them to live with their pain. Toye and Jenkins explore the use of qualitative research in pain education. Finally, Barker illustrates the usefulness of qualitative research findings for redesigning and commissioning healthcare services. 
 
Warmest thanks to all the contributors who took the time to be part of this special edition. I have been overwhelmed by their generous contributions, particularly those who responded to my ‘cold calls’. I would encourage the British Journal of Pain to continue to review and include qualitative research. Thanks also to Professors Michelle Briggs, Nick Allcock and Eloise Carr for contributing their ideas to this project at the outset. The challenge for qualitative health researchers is now to present accessible research findings that can have a real impact on clinical practice.