In the adult hospitalized inpatient receiving antibiotic therapy (P), how does the addition of probiotic therapy (I) compared with no probiotic therapy (C) affect the probability of developing antibiotic-associated diarrhea (O) during antibiotic therapy (T)?
Paper details:
Purpose of the Paper:
The purpose of this paper is to begin the review of literature and other written materials and determine the current evidence base for your clinical question. You will not be able to review all of the evidence during this course. However, at the conclusion of the course you should have reviewed a substantial amount of literature and become somewhat of an “expert” on the knowledge base related to your clinical question.
You can expect to continue reviewing literature and additional evidence when you enroll in the professional project as a capstone to your curriculum. Knowledge development is ongoing, not usually stagnant, and it is important to keep abreast of new publications and findings in your area.
The following should be included in the paper:
a. INTRODUCTION:
The introduction presents the need for the study you are proposing. Provide references that support this topic as a compelling issue in nursing today. Avoid using opinion statements unless you are quoting an expert from printed materials. A scientific paper such as this assignment is based on printed authoritative data and not your opinion. Avoid use of terms such as “should” and “must do…..” This is a report on others printed data. Also avoid use of adjectives such as “absolutely must.”….”extremely.” Instead, again state the printed facts that are supported by references.
This is a good place to introduce information that does not fit in your literature review such as general statistics about the problem, etc. Include cost issues to health care, if relevant; usually cost is very relevant. Include quality of life issues for the targeted population. Make a clear point as to how the clinical issue relates to your practice as a MSN or DNP student.
b. STATEMENT OF CLINICAL QUESTION
You should include the variables of study and population of study. This is a good place to use the PICO format (Melnyk & Fineout-Overholt, 2011).
c. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK (brief overview)
Choose and describe a theoretical framework useful for understanding the variable(s) in your clinical question. Provide a brief overview of the theory or framework including author(s), major concepts, and relationships among concepts. Include a diagram of how your paper topic variables fit in the proposed framework.
d. THEORETICAL AND OPERATIONAL DEFINITIONS
Define the study variables in a theoretical format and an operational format.
Another way to think of the study variables is to identify the PICO statement components as concepts. The concepts are variables.
The theoretical definition(s) will be cited from an authoritative source and describes what another author means when using this term.
The operational definition(s):
Will be the meaning you hold for your chosen variables in this literature search. You may use another author’s definition as your own, but you must identify that you have done so. Cite a reference when indicated.
e. TRANSITION PARAGRAPH:
This paragraph serves as a transition from the above content to introducing the review of major variables found in the literature.
f. REVIEW OF LITERATURE – A MINIMUM OF 3-5 ARTICLES SHOULD BE DISCUSSED
1. Discuss electronic search strategies used including databases searched, search terms per database, and years searched per database. Include the number of “hits” with each search strategy. Identify the iterative process you followed to narrow or expand your search to find the best evidence.
2. State inclusion and exclusion criteria for literature and rationale for inclusion and exclusion criteria.
3. Critique the literature including research design, sampling method, research methodology, analysis of data, conclusions derived from findings, scientific and/or clinical significance of findings. Address the internal validity of the cited study. Place this content into a concise table with these column headings. In the narrative of your paper give a general description (overview) of what you found.
4. Studies reviewed should be relevant to the clinical question and variables. Important studies should be discussed in depth with regard to methodology and findings.
5. Primary sources should be reviewed
g. DETERMINATION OF THE EVIDENCE-BASE FOR YOUR CLINICAL QUESTION
Grade the literature you reviewed. Discuss what criteria you are using to determine the strongest evidence for your literature base. You may choose to use the criteria in the Evans article, any of your textbooks, or another source as a guide. But you must use a source and its documented criteria. You may choose to include a table of the material reviewed, or some other way to organize your decision-making. Include text about the state of the current evidence and include:
1. Report areas of agreement and disagreement
2. Report gaps in evidence base
h. CONCLUDING PARAGRAPH:
Summarize the findings and link the findings to your clinical question. Get to the point, state the point, and wrap it up. Include a statement about each of the above sections, e.g. what nursing theory guides the need for this clinical question? What is the answer to your clinical question based on the literature reviewed? What is the strength of the evidence? What is the next step for you with this topic? Will you drop this topic based on not enough literature to support further study? Is the PICO statement too simple? Do you need to adapt the PICOT question and search further in the next courses? Identify what is next with the paper findings.