Category Archives: research

Case study, EBP, Evidence based nursing, evidence based practice, research, Research class

Fun Methods. Serious Content.

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Enjoy this 2+-minute, homegrown, YouTube video about our 7-year collaborative, EBP/research project recorded per request of a presenter at the Association for Nursing Staff Development conference.  (I admit it’s intimidating to watch myself.)

Check out the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8KUIt_Uq9k. fun frog

Key points from our efforts:  EBP/research learning should be fun.  Content, serious!  

The related publication that records some of our fun efforts and the full collaborative picture: Highfield, M.E.F., Collier, A., Collins, M., & Crowley, M. (2016). Partnering to promote evidence-based practice in a community hospital: Implications for nursing professional development specialists, Journal of Nursing Staff Development, 32(3):130-6. doi: 10.1097/NND.0000000000000227.

Clinical practice guidelines, Evidence based nursing, evidence based practice, reading research, research, Research class

It’s Up to you: Accept the Status Quo or Challenge it

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Yes.  Change can be painful.question

Yes. It is easier to do things the way we’ve always done them (and been seemingly successful).

Yet, most of us want to work more efficiently or improve our own or patients’ health.Tension

 So, there you have the problem: a tension between status quo and change. Perhaps taking the easy status quo is why ‘everyday nurses’ don’t read research.

Ralph (2017) writes encountering 3 common mindsets that keep nurses stuck in the rut of refusing to examine new research:

  1. I’m not a researcher.
  2. I don’t value research.
  3. I don’t have time to read research.

But, he argues, you have a choice: you can go with the status quo or challenge it (Ralph).  And (admit it), haven’t we all found that the status quo sometimes doesn’t work well so that we end up

  • choosing a “work around,” or
  • ignoring/avoiding the problem or
  • leaving the problem for someone else or
  • ….[well….,you pick an action.]

TensionHow to begin solving the problem of not reading research? Think of a super-interesting topic to you and make a quick trip to PubMed.com. Check out a few relevant abstracts and ask your librarian to get the articles for you. Read them in the nurses’ lounge so others can, too.

Let me know how your challenge to the status quo works out.

Bibliography: Fulltext available for download through https://www.researchgate.net/ of  Ralph, N. (2017 April). Editorial: Engaging with research & evidence is a nursing priority so why are ‘everyday’ nurses not reading the literature, ACORN 30(3):3-5. doi: 10.26550/303/3.5

Methods, Questionnaires, Reliability & validity, research, Research class

Research Words of the Week: Reliability & Validity

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Reliability & validity are terms that refer to the consistency and accuracy of a quantitative measurement questionnaire, technical device, ruler, or any other measuring device.  It means that the outcome measure can be trusted and is relatively error free.

  • Reliability – This means that the instrument measures CONSISTENTLY
  • Validity – This means that the instrument measures ACCURATELY. In other words it measures what it is supposed to measure and not something else.

For example: If your bathroom scale measures weight, then it is a valid measure of weight (e.g. it doesn’t measure BP or stress). You might say it had high validity. If your bathroom scale measures your weight as the same thing when you step on and off of it several times then it is measuring weight reliably  or consistently; and you might say it has high reliability.

Clinical practice guidelines, Data, EBP, Evidence based nursing, evidence based practice, Evidence hierarchy, NNT, research, Safety

More? Not always better! Check out NNT.

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EBPPractice based in evidence (EBP) means that you must critique/synthesize evidence and then apply it to particular setting and populations using your best judgement.  This means that you must discriminate about when (and when NOT) to apply the research.  Be sure to use best professional judgment to particularize your actions to the situation!

Add to your repertoire of EBP tools,  ratiothe Number Needed to Treat (NNT).   This is not mumbo -jumbo.   NNT explained here–short & sweet: http://www.thennt.com/thennt-explained/ 

FindingsCRITICAL THINKING:   Check out this or other analyses at the site.  How does the info on antihypertensives for mild hypertension answer the question of whether more is better?  Are there patients in whom you SHOULD treat mild HTN?  (“We report, you decide.”)   http://www.thennt.com/nnt/anti-hypertensives-for-cardiovascular-prevention-in-mild-hypertension/

MORE INFO:  Check out what the data say about other risk/benefit treatments at http://www.thennt.com/ 

Data, quantitative research, reading research, research

Goldilocks and the 3 Levels of Data

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Actually when it comes to quantitative data, there are 4 levels, but who’s counting? (Besides Goldilocks.)

  1. Nominal  (categorical) data are names or categories: (gender, religious affiliation, days of the week, yes or no, and so on)
  2. Ordinal data are like the pain scale.  Each number is higher (or lower) than the next but the distances between numbers are not equal.  In others words 4 is not necessarily twice as much as 2; and 5 is not half of 10.
  3. Interval data are like degrees on a thermometer.  Equal distance between them, but no actual “0”.  0 degrees is just really, really cold.
  4. Ratio data are those  with real 0 and equal intervals (e.g., weight, annual salary, mg.)

(Of course if you want to collect QUALitative word data, that’s closest to categorical/nominal, but you don’t count ANYTHING.  More on that another time.)

CRITICAL THINKING:   Where are the levels in Goldilocks and the 3 levels of data at this link:  https://son.rochester.edu/research/research-fables/goldilocks.html ?? Would you measure soup, bed, chairs, bears, or other things differently?  Why was the baby bear screaming in fright?

Disseminating findings, EBP, evidence based practice, research

Creation & Use of Evidence: Different!

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The difference between research and evidence-based practice (EBP) can sometimes be confusing, but the contrast between them is sharp.  I think most of the confusion comes because those implementing both processes measure outcomes.  Here are differences:

  • RESEARCH :  The process of research (formulating an answerable question, designing project methods, collecting and analyzing the data, and interpreting themagnifyingGlassmeaning of results) is creating knowledge (AKA creating research evidence).  A research project that has been written up IS evidence that can be used in practice.  The process of research is guided by the scientific method.
  • EVIDENCE-BASED PRACTICE:   EBP is using existing knowledge (AKA using EBPresearch evidence) in practice.  While researchers create new knowledge,

The creation of evidence obviously precedes its application to practice.  Something must be made before it can be used.  Research obviously precedes the application of research findings to practice.  When those findings are applied to practice, then we say the practice is evidence-based.

A good analogy for how research & EBP differ & work together can be seen in autos.

CreateCar
Creating a car!

 

  • Designers & factory workers create new cars.

    UseCar
    Using a car!
  • Drivers use existing cars that they choose according to preferences and best judgments about safety.

 

 

CRITICAL THINKING:   1) Why is the common phrase “evidence-based research” unclear?  Should you use it?  Why or why not?  2) What is a clinical question you now face. (e.g., C.Diff spread; nurse morale on your unit; managing neuropathic pain) and think about how the Stetler EBP model at http://www.nccmt.ca/registry/resource/pdf/83.pdf  might help.  Because you will be measuring outcomes, then why is this still considered EBP.

Paradigm, reading research, research, Research design

What IS research!!??

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WHAT IS RESEARCH?   Take < three minutes to check out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v50ct9xJVKE .  Listen for what research is and 2 basic ways to approach the man-person-legs-grass.jpganswers to a research question: “Why is the sky blue?”

CRITICAL THINKING:  What is a recent problem you’ve experienced in clinical practice?  Write out a positivist question and an interpretist research question related to that same clinical problem.

Clinical practice guidelines, Disseminating findings, Evidence based nursing, Publishing, quality improvement, RCT, research, School papers, Writing

Write Away!

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Want to know the standardized format for writing up your research study, QI report, Writing1case study, systematic review, or clinical practice guideline?    Check out these standardized reporting guidelines: http://www.equator-network.org/reporting-guidelines/

Of course you should always give priority to the author instructions for the particular journal in which you want to publish, but most adhere generally or fully to these standardized guides.

Write away!

Data collection, Questionnaires, research, research methods, Survey

“Please answer….” (cont.)

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What do people HATE about online surveys?   If you want to improve your response rates, check out SurveyMonkey Eric V’s (May Mail2017)  Eliminate survey fatigue: Fix 3 things your respondents hate 

For more info: Check out my earlier post “Please Answer!”

Evidence based nursing, evidence based practice, Evidence hierarchy, Literature review, Novice to Expert, Professional Nursing, Qualitative research, research

Missing in Action: The Pyramid foundation

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Last post I commented on the potentially misleading terms of Filtered & Unfiltered Filtered Unfiltered jpgresearch.  My key point?  Much so-called “unfiltered research” has been screened (filtered) carefully through peer-review before publication; while some “filtered research”  may have been ‘filtered’ only by a single expert & be out of date. If we use the terms filtered and unfiltered we should not be naive about their meanings. (Pyramid source:  Wikimedia Commons )

This week, I address what I see as a 2nd problem with this evidence based medicine pyramid.  That is, missing in action from it are descriptive, correlation, & in-depth qualitative research are not mentioned.  Where are they?  This undercuts the EBM pyramid as a teaching tool and also (intentionally or not) denigrates the necessary basic type of research on which stronger levels of evidence are built.  That foundation of the pyramid, called loosely “background information,” includes such basic, essential research.

Ask an ExpertYou may have heard of Benner’s Novice to Expert  theory.  Benner used in-depth, qualitative interview descriptions as data to generate her theory.  Yet that type of research evidence is missing from medicine’s pyramid!  Without a clear foundation the pyramid will just topple over.  Better be clear!

I recommend substituting (or at least adding to your repertoire) an Evidence Based NURSING (EBN) pyramid.  Several versions exist & one is below that includes some of the previously missing research!  This one includes EBP & QI projects, too! Notice the explicit addition of detail to the below pyramid as described at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfRbuzzKjcM.EBN

Critical thinking:  #1List some EBM & EBN pyramid differences.  #2 Figure out where on the hierarchy this project would go: Crowell, J., OʼNeil, K., & Drager, L. (2017). Project HANDS: A bundled approach to increase short peripheral catheter dwell time. Journal of Infusion Nursing, 40(5), 274-280. doi: 10.1097/NAN.0000000000000237.   1st use medicine’s EBM pyramid; & then 2nd use nursing’s EBN pyramid.  #3 Label Crowell et al.’s study as filtered or unfiltered and explain what you mean by that.

For more info:  Watch the YouTube video at the link above.