Evidence‐based practice for the busy nurse practitioner: Part two: Searching for the best evidence to clinical inquiries

Abstract

For the busy NP, EBP has emerged as an important strategy to maintain valid, accurate, and relevant clinical knowledge. It is expected that this part of the series will enable NPs to identify appropriate databases to answer clinical inquires while refining their search strategy skills, which takes both time and practice.

Finding a needle in the haystack: performing an in-depth literature search to answer a clinical question

“…Developing the skills necessary to locate relevant literature is the first critical step to access current scientific information and understand the evidence on any given topic. 14,15,17 Search strategy skills help to hone a search that will extract the most relevant information from the existing published literature. The appropriate use of Boolean operations, search vocabulary, and delimiters enhance the quality of the search and are necessary to locate published evidence to address clinical problems.…”

“…[11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18] However, barriers to implementing EBP include: an overwhelming amount of information; lack of skill in search/retrieval; lack of time; challenges in reading, evaluating, and understanding the reports; negative attitudes toward research; and limited exposure to research-utilization strategies. 5,[19][20][21] Locating the needed published research to serve practice purposes can be a daunting task, rather like finding a needle in the proverbial haystack, and requires skill in order to perform a search proficiently and without being overwhelmed.…”

Evidence‐based practice for the busy nurse practitioner: Part four: Putting it all together

“…Several hierarchy variations exist, with the strongest level of evidence being referred to as Level I (systematic reviews [SRs] and meta‐analysis) and the weakest as Level VI (case studies, expert opinion) (The Cochrane Collection, 2008; Melnyk & Fineout‐Overholt, ; Newhouse, ; Newhouse, Dearholt, Poe, Pugh, & White, ; Sackett, Strauss, Richardson, Rosenberg, & Haynes, ; Strauss et al, ). For more specific instructions on searching the literature, see Part 2 of this series (Facchiano & Hoffman Snyder, ).…”

Approaches for Improving Literature Review Methods

“…Think about your research question from different angles and don't hesitate to experiment with different approaches or combinations of search terms. Each time you formulate a query or take a moment to explore or experiment with the functionality of a database, you are adding to your skill set (Facchiano & Snyder, 2012). 3.…”

“…What journal titles are represented in the database? As a rule, it is necessary to consult more than one database to catch everything (Facchiano & Snyder, 2012;McFadden, Taylor, Campbell, & McQuilkin, 2012 (Fan, n.d.). Each piece of the PICO presents a key word that can be searched or a term to be looked for in a database's thesaurus.…”