Evidenced based practice

Answer

Evidence-Based Practice

Introduction

• To provide an analysis of McKee et al.’s (2017) article.
• Parameters: Independent and dependent variables and concepts.
• Defining variables operationally and conceptually.
• The demographic variables.

Independent and Independent Variable

• Independent variable: Research capacity building (McKee et al.’s, 2017).
• Inconsistency regarding the meaning of the term research capacity building (McKee et al., 2017).
• Participation of clinical nurses in research is still low (McKee et al., 2017).
• Personal level barriers.
• Organizational level barriers
• Dependent Variables in McKee et al.’s, (2017) study, include leadership, research capacity, and expertise.
• Enhancement of research capacity (McKee et al., 2017).
• Provision of expertise and development of the research capacity (McKee et al., 2017).
• Sourcing of funding (McKee et al., 2017).
• McKee et al.’s, (2017), lacked a clearly defined intervention or a standard intervention.

Consistency of Research Variables with the Purpose of the Study

• First of all, the purpose of McKee et al.’s (2017) is not clearly defined.
• The purpose - an intervention to increase research participation in advanced clinical nursing roles (McKee et al., 2017).
• Difficult to identify the dependent and independent variable.
• The reader cannot outrightly identify the purpose of the study.
• There is unclear link between increased participation of clinical nurses in research with the intervention.

Relationship between Research Variables and Concepts Identified in the Research Framework

• Research variables are to some degree relevant to the concepts identified in the research framework (McKee et al., 2017).
• McKee et al. (2017), employed mixed methods research design as well as implementation science framework.
• Mixed method approach.
• Quantitative data was drawn from focus group discussions while quantitative data was obtained from self-reported questionnaires (McKee et al., 2017).
• Justification of implementation science approach lacking (McKee et al., 2017).

Conceptual and Operational Definition of Variables

• Research variables are not clearly and precisely defined in the study.
• Conceptual definition of the independent variable provided
• On the other hand, dependent variables have not be clearly defined (McKee et al., 2017).
• The authors do not specify specific variables that were measured quantitively (McKee et al., 2017).
• Conceptual definition of variables is based on various research studies (McKee et al., 2017).

Analysis of Conceptual Definition of Variables Versus Operational Definition

• There is some level of relation between conceptual definition and operational definitions (McKee et al., 2017).
• Focused group discussions and thematic analysis (McKee et al., 2017).
• The SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunity, and Threat) approach (McKee et al., 2017).
• Difficult to determine whether there is consistency between conceptual and operational definition of variables in McKee et al.’s (2017) study.

Demographic Variables

• The hospital site was a large 1020 bed urban acute teaching hospital (McKee et al., 2017).
• The study lasted for about two (2) years.
• 17 advanced practice nurses responded to the first call for participation in the study.
• During the first-year of study 12 clinical nurse researchers participated (McKee et al., 2017).

• Response rate for questionnaire completion was 58% (McKee et al., 2017).
• Leadership components (McKee et al., 2017).
• Funding was applied for annually for the post-doctoral research fellow (McKee et al., 2017).
• Group membership was made up of the clinical nurse researcher, academic support, and post-doctoral research fellow (McKee et al., 2017).
• Other supports included online resources, statistical tools, and referencing tools.
• Education support was achieved through on-line access to formal research classes, needs based skill classes developed and presented (McKee et al., 2017).
• Group characteristics included small groups (number of members not specified), nurse led research question, and academic linked expertise (McKee et al., 2017).

Identification and Control of Extraneous Variables

• The authors failed to identify and control for extraneous variables in their study.
• According to Kahlert et al. (2017), extraneous or confounding variables should be identified and controlled during the design and control phase.
• Confounding variable is any variable that can hamper causal inferences (Kahlert et al., 2017).
• Confounding arises when a factor is associated with both the exposure and outcome (Kahlert et al., 2017).
• Unclear causal inferences
• In order to understand data at extensive manner confounding or extraneous variables need to be identified in a given study.
• Since confounding variables were not taken into consideration, different results may be obtained if the study is repeated (Kahlert et al., 2017).
• The study findings cannot be generalized (McKee et al., 2017).

Potential Confounding (Extraneous) Variables

• Lack of education and engagement of potential research participants, lack of participant motivation to participate in the study, and lack of nurse self-drive conduct clinical research (McKee et al., 2017).
• These potential extraneous variables contributed to use of a small research sample (12 participants) and low response rate (7 respondents) (McKee et al., 2017).
• Small sample size and low response rate led to lack of generalizability of findings (McKee et al., 2017).