Help please in naming actual issue- I am terrible at this

[amychisom]

I am having to do research for the first time and have been a nurse for 20 years. I seen completely dumbfounded. My question is,"Should all newly diagnosed spinal cord patients be placed on special beds (such as air fluid beds- i.e.: Clinitron) to prevent pressure sores while in-patient or in re-hab?"

Is this enough? Or do I need more for the actual clinical problem?

Thank you!

[meanmaryjean, DNP, RN]

A research question should never be one that can be answered 'yes' or 'no'. Re-worded, you might ask "How does the use of specialty beds impact pressure sore development in newly diagnosed spinal cord injury patients?"

[suzy12]

I agree with the above as you need to argue it with solid evidence based literature. Then you add a conclusion, what sort of research are you doing? Is it action research?

[amychisom]

I was just doing research on pressure sores in spinal cord patients. Any ideas on how I should direct the research? I have never done research before until now and this is confusing to me. What would be the best route to go with this subject?

[amychisom]

I was going to include inpatient and rehab settings also in the research for facility setting.

[meanmaryjean, DNP, RN]

I guess it depends what you have at your disposal. Do you have two facilities willing to let you have access to patients? Do you have actual beds to compare? Are you wanting to do actual research involving human subjects? Or are you saying 'research' meaning reviewing evidence that's put there and making a purchasing decision based on what you find in the literature?

[amychisom]

I mean research by evidence-based literature that is put there and me making a decision based on what I find in my reading.

[amychisom]

Do you think "How does the use of specialty beds impact pressure sore development in newly diagnosed spinal cord injury patients in inpatient and rehabilitation settings?" is ok as long as I can find evidenced based literature on it? And btw, thank you for answering me....

[CrunchRN, ADN, RN]

Look into the library at your local health science center or med schools. The librarians will help you shape the search properly.

[amychisom]

The problem is I do my schooling all online, so I primarily am on my own. That's why I think I'm so lost. And I have less than a week to do this. I've been reading my chapter on coming up with an appropriate question, but it just gives you the PICO analysis. So it makes it a little harder to decide. I feel a little hand-tied, but I have to somehow fix the topic and come up with a proper research that I can find evidence-based research to back up the topic for.

[meanmaryjean, DNP, RN]

Your questions sounds fine, but I would put it in PICOT format (in other words, change the phrasing around to align with PICOT). You should be able to find a fair amount as pressure ulcers and prevention are a major nursing quality indicator. I think the hardest thing in doing an evidence-based project like this is finding good search terms. Make a list of every term you could search related to this. For example, you might find older or foreign journals use the term 'bedsore' in place of 'pressure ulcer'. Likewise, terms for specialty beds, mattresses, overlays, and brand names of beds.

Good luck!

[Clovery]

So this is research for a school assignment? When I have to do research assignments, I pick a general topic of interest, like what you've done - pressure sores in spinal cord patients. Then I find all of the journal articles I can related to the topic. Based on the information I've found, I then formulate my question. This is kind of a backwards way of doing it, but it helps you to avoid backing yourself into a research corner by choosing a problem that has very little literature already written on it.

Of course if you were doing actual research, this wouldn't be the way to go about it. But for a paper, which is just an exercise in finding and reporting evidence, make your life easier by letting the existing literature guide your topic.