Nurses Information Appraisal Within the Clinical Setting

New nurses apply only basic source evaluation criteria but realize their skills are lacking: More sophisticated approaches to teaching evaluation skills are required

“…Practicing nurses need the skills to determine what is good information, not only for clinical application but also to help patients who increasingly turn to the Internet for information to learn about their health conditions (Cader, 2013; Gilmour et al, 2012; Shiferaw et al, 2020), even though that information is not as holistic as what nurses can provide (Haase et al, 2018). Yet, Miller et al (2010) established in the abstract of their study that “nurses are challenged to find and use reliable, credible information to support clinical decision‐making and to meet expectations for evidence‐based nursing practice.” This finding was echoed by Carter‐Templeton (2013) who found that the critical appraisal process is not well understood and that nurses mainly rely on other nurses for information. Finding reliable information is especially challenging on the Internet where information is vast, free, and varies widely in quality.…”

“…Evaluation or critical appraisal is what bridges finding information and using that information in clinical practice (Carter‐Templeton, 2013). Practicing nurses need the skills to determine what is good information, not only for clinical application but also to help patients who increasingly turn to the Internet for information to learn about their health conditions (Cader, 2013; Gilmour et al, 2012; Shiferaw et al, 2020), even though that information is not as holistic as what nurses can provide (Haase et al, 2018).…”