Demonstrate an understanding of the significance and value of evidence based practice in informing health and social care, including policy and guideline development.
Demonstrate knowledge of research designs and methods.
Recognise the strengths and weaknesses of key research approaches.
Recognise the importance of ethical issues in research design and implementation.
Using an appropriate research critiquing framework, demonstrate an ability to appraise research.
Module specific information can be found on Moodle.
Assignment Brief
Students will write a structured 2000 word literature review on a research topic of their choice. The assignment will enable students to explore and engage with the evidence-base around their chosen topic. Writing a literature review will enhance awareness of the current state of knowledge in a specific area, devlelop critical thinking and analytical skills and build confidence in literature search skills. Evidence-based practice is a paradigm within health and social care and literature and systematic reviews have a vital role to play in supporting practitioners to stay upto-date in their knowledge. The assignment will enable students to demonstrate achievement of all learning outcomes while considering evidence based practice within a broad conceptual frame.
Suggested assignment structure:
INTRODUCTION:
Why undertake a literature review?
What is your question and why is it important to practice?
Inclusion criteria – what are your search terms and search strategy?
MAIN SECTION:
Describe the two key research methodologies.
Identify any strengths and weaknesses with respect to how the studies were carried out
Do the studies raise any ethical issues? Explain
CONCLUSION:
What are the findings/results?
How might the findings/results lead to practice development?
How might the findings/results inform policies/guidelines?
INTRODUCTION:
This section should contain the following:
Why undertake a literature review?
Here you will outline the reasons why literature reviews are carried out and why they are so important. This should be a generic discussion rather than being specific to your own review. You may choose to discuss systematic reviews here too (L.O. 1);
What is your question and why is it important to practice?
Here you should state the question you wish to answer and why it is important to your practice. For example, if you work with service-users with dementia it would be useful to know whether specific strategies interventions/strategies such as reminiscence work are actually helpful for individuals with this condition. In this case your question would be something like “what are the effects of reminiscence work with older adults with dementia?” (L.O. 1);
Inclusion criteria – what are your search terms and search strategy? Here you should state what your search terms were and what your search strategy was. Think about which studies you have selected and why. This requires you to consider your inclusion and exclusion criteria. For example, will you exclude all studies conducted outside the UK? Will you include only studies from the past 5/10 years, or will you include older ones This section should be around 250-300 words.
MAIN SECTION:
This section should contain the following:
Describe the two key research methodologies.
Here offers a definition of the two key methodologies in research – quantitative and qualitative (L.O. 4 and 5);
Identify any strengths and weaknesses with respect to how the studies were carried out.
Here you will need to identify the methodological approach (e.g.
quantitative/qualitative) and specific methods (e.g. randomised controlled trials, interviews or questionnaires) used. Use the critiquing tools discussed in the module to identify strengths and weaknesses in:
The studies’ methodology. You should group your discussion around the questions/criteria chosen. For example, keep your responses regarding the
‘appropriateness of the sample’ together (L.O.4, 5, 6 and 8);
Do the studies raise any ethical issues? Explain. Here you will use the specific ethical principles discussed during the module to frame and guide your discussion. You should draw on at least 2 of the specific ethical principles discussed. (L.O.7).
This section should be around 1400-1500 words.
CONCLUSION:
What are the findings/results? Here you should draw some conclusions about the question you asked. For example, if you wanted to find out whether a particular type of intervention for older adults with dementia was actually effective, try to come to some conclusions about this. Be aware though, that there will be some limitations associated with your review. For example, you probably haven’t exhausted the evidence-base on this topic/question due to the limitations of the assignment, so you won’t be able to draw definitive conclusions at this stage. Think about how you might achieve a more definitive answer (e.g. conducting a systematic review perhaps?) (L.O. 1 & 3);
How might the findings/results lead to practice development? Here you will need to consider what the findings might mean for practice development. Do your findings suggest that current practices could be improved or perhaps a new approach needed? For example, if you conclude that, for example, ‘Signing for the Brain’ projects lead to improvements in
wellbeing/quality of life for older adults with dementia, you might recommend that this be implemented in settings for adults with dementia/cognitive impairment.
(L.O.1 and 2);
How might the findings/results inform policies/guidelines? Here you should discuss the implications of your findings/results for policies/guidelines on this topic/issue. For example, if you conclude that healthcare practitioners are unaware of the importance of hand hygiene compliance, this would suggest that current policies/guidelines and local Trust policy require improvements (L.O.2).
This section should be around 250-300 words.
General Assignment Guidance:
Structuring your main section: do not try to discuss all your studies separately. Instead group them thematically using your appraisal criteria/questions to help structure your discussion.
You will need to draw on around 10 studies, but no more than 15. Many topics you may consider have been researched extensively such as hand hygiene compliance or pressure ulcer care/management. Therefore, you’ll need to select your chosen 10-15 studies carefully, being clear about why you included these in your review and not others. For example, you may decide only to include studies which involve APs/HCAs as participants rather than, for example, doctors and consultants. This is fine as one of your exclusion criteria but remember to state this and give your reasons why. Another inclusion criterion might be ‘only studies which involve service-users as participants’. Again, this is a good inclusion criterion but be sure to state this and give your reason.
With respect to your 10 – 15 studies, you will not be required to critique them all. However, if you do refer to a study in your review you will need to provide a full reference in your reference list as per UWE Harvard protocol.
For less extensively covered/unusual topics, you may find you cannot afford to be too choosy. In this case, review what you have but, again, be clear about your parameters. For example, would you want to include a study that’s more than 20 years old, given that the landscape in which health and social care are delivered has moved on so much?
Try to avoid questions which would be difficult to answer. For example, concepts such as ‘happiness’ or ‘wellbeing’ are very subjective and therefore could be difficult to measure. Therefore, avoid questions such as ‘how happy are service-users with the care they receive in A and E departments?’ unless you’re prepared to specify precisely what is meant by ‘happiness’ and define clear criteria for measuring it!
Avoid vague questions: the more specific the better! For example, rather than asking ‘what is the best treatment for leg ulcers?’ how about asking ‘what is the effectiveness of Manuka honey in treating leg ulcers in adults admitted to hospital?’ Also, a very broad question (and therefore broad search terms) will throw up hundreds, if not thousands of hits during your literature search and you could end up being overwhelmed by the sheer volume of evidence.
You will probably find you need to separate out the quantitative and qualitative studies when discussing them. This is advisable given that the 2 types of approach tend to ask slightly different questions or take a slightly different focus, although they are on the same topic. Take the topic of hand hygiene compliance, for example: quantitative studies may ask about the number of healthcare practitioners who are compliant with hand hygiene protocol, which is helpful to know. However, qualitative work on this topic will explore questions such as why some practitioners are not compliant with hand hygiene protocol. Both questions are equally important and, from a practice development point-of-view, should be seen as equally valid. In fact, in your concluding section you could bring both these important insights together.
Your question should guide the search terms used. Aveyard and Sharp (2013,
p.99) give the following example: “what is the attitude of student [nurses] to
HIV/AIDS?”. This leads to the following search terms: Attitude AND Student
AND Nurse AND HIV OR AIDS. Don’t be afraid to use Boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT) as these will help eliminate irrelevant studies and lead you to those which are.
Keep a clear record of your search terms and where/how each study was located as you go along, you’ll need this information in your write up and also if you need to find them again for subsequent assignments.
Write references in full every time you find something useful. This will support you in developing your referencing skills and also make it easier to find the items again. You could create a word document for your references which will then form your reference list which you will submit in your assignment (standard Harvard protocol applies).
Be careful about sources of evidence. Whilst Google (for example) may offer a useful starting point, you cannot be sure of the quality of the evidence arising from this search strategy. Instead, use recognised academic databases such as the repository.
