PICOT question assistance

[IAmTiredRN]

Hello everyone,

I am researching for my capstone and I am struggling with developing a PICOT question. My topic is IM injections, and making the ventrogluteal site the site of choice for injections (basically to maybe implement a policy to say use this site whenever possible). I'm looking at the risks with the dorsogluteal site, and not sure if that should be part of my PICOT or not (sciatic nerve injury, injecting into the sub-q space in obese patients, etc.). So my areas are as follows:

P = nurses

I = ventrogluteal IM injections

C = compared to dorsogluteal injections

O = ????

T = not sure what a good time frame is.....6 months, 1 year....?

Thanks so much for any assistance!

[meanmaryjean, DNP, RN]

First, are nurses your population of interest? Not patients?

Are you wanting to look at injuries associated with these injection? Then your outcome should reflect that.

What about "In patients requiring intramuscular injections, how does the use of ventrogluteal sites compared to dorsogluteal sites affect sciatic nerve injury rates?"

My suggestion would be to FIRST search the literature and THEN see what evidence is out there. You may find there is not enough to support this as a topic.

[llg, PhD, RN]

It sounds to me as if you have already made up your mind about which site is better. If that's the case, then there is no PICOT question there. If you already know the answer, there is no need to do the project.

If I am wrong about that -- and you are still open to the possibility that the ventrogluteal site might NOT be the best site -- then your basic question would be one of "which site is better?" and you would have to find a way to operationalize "better." Which site as fewer complications? Which site delivers the medication most effectively? Which site is easier for the nurse to use? Which site do patients find more comfortable? etc. You are going to have to define and operationalize "better" to answer the "which site is better" question. It that is truly your question at this point.

If you have already decided that ventrogluteal is better ... then you have to figure out what your real issue is. Is it "how to get the nurses to use that site?" If that is the case, then your population is nurses, not patients -- and you will be looking to compare methods of changing practice. It's a nursing education topic or nursing change agent topic -- and you'll be comparing 2 different methods of effecting change.