Discussion: Searching Databases
When you decide to purchase a new car, you first decide what is important to you. If mileage and dependability are the important factors, you will search for data focused more on these factors and less on color options and sound systems.
The same holds true when searching for research evidence to guide your clinical inquiry and professional decisions. Developing a formula for an answerable, researchable question that addresses your need will make the search process much more effective. One such formula is the PICO(T) format.
In this Discussion, you will transform a clinical inquiry into a searchable question in PICO(T) format, so you can search the electronic databases more effectively and efficiently. You will share this PICO(T) question and examine strategies you might use to increase the rigor and effectiveness of a database search on your PICO(T) question.
To Prepare:
- Review the Resources and identify a clinical issue of interest that can form the basis of a clinical inquiry.
- Review the materials offering guidance on using databases, performing keyword searches, and developing PICO(T) questions provided in the Resources.
- Based on the clinical issue of interest and using keywords related to the clinical issue of interest, search at least two different databases in the Walden Library to identify at least four relevant peer-reviewed articles related to your clinical issue of interest. You should not be using systematic reviews for this assignment, select original research articles.
- Review the Resources for guidance and develop a PICO(T) question of interest to you for further study. It is suggested that an Intervention-type PICOT question be developed as these seem to work best for this course.
By Day 3 of Week 4
Post a brief description of your clinical issue of interest.
This clinical issue will remain the same for the entire course and will be the basis for the development of your PICOT question.
Describe your search results in terms of the number of articles returned on original research and how this changed as you added search terms using your Boolean operators.
Finally, explain strategies you might make to increase the rigor and effectiveness of a database search on your PICO(T) question.
Be specific and provide examples.
Solution
Prevention of Ventilator-Acquired Pneumonia in a Long-Term Acute Care Unit
Hospitalized patients have significant risks of developing nosocomial infections. However, patients hospitalized in the critical care units have relatively higher risks of developing these infections than those hospitalized in the general wards (Wolfensberger et al., 2018). The risk is higher because these patients have compromised primary defense mechanisms, which allow microbial agents to colonize the lower and upper respiratory tract. Healthcare professionals often use the Ventilator-Associated Pneumonia bundle (VAP bundle) to develop strategies for minimizing the risk of infection. The bundle consists of head elevation, sectioning of secretion, hand hygiene, oral hygiene, and early weaning from ventilators for stable patients (Modi & Kovacs, 2020). Although this bundle is essential in mitigating VAP, it is not common knowledge for all nurses working in critical care nursing.
The PICOT question for this project is: Among hospitalized critical care patients (P), how does the application of routine nursing care with a ventilator-associated pneumonia checklist (I) minimize the risk of Ventilator-associated pneumonia (O) compared to the application of routine nursing care alone (C) within the hospitalization period in the intensive care unit (T)? This project utilized various
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