Research Critiques and PICOT Statement Final Draft

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Quantitative Research

Research Critique: Quantitative Studies

Lara Ashton

Grand Canyon University

NRS 433V-0500: Introduction to Nursing Research

Sheranda M. Fesler

13 June 2023

Research Critique: Quantitative Studies

Introduction

Nursing burnout is a serious healthcare system concern in the United States, with 62% of nurses experiencing the problem. It involves mental, emotional, and physical exhaustion due to prolonged and excessive stress. Burnout is more common among young nurses aged below 25 and those working in critical care departments. Nursing practice is a highly demanding and exhausting profession where practitioners are required to provide patient care with empathy and patience, but in a highly stressful working environment with excessive workloads and limited resources, creating room for burnout. The main causes of nursing burnout include long working hours, increased workloads, poor working conditions, and overwhelming emotions because of witnessing sickness and death. Among the symptoms of nursing burnout are exhaustion, anxiety, sickness and illness, lack of motivation, feeling helpless, low career satisfaction, withdrawal, poor judgment, substance abuse, and absenteeism. Nursing burnout has a serious impact on patient care and healthcare organizations in general. For instance, burnout is associated with increased rates of medication errors, poor patient engagement, compromised care quality, poor patient experience, worsened patient safety, and an increased rate of hospital-acquired infections. Self-care is critical to preventing and reducing burnout among nurses and improving their well-being for better productivity. Some strategies for self-care include getting enough sleep, asking for help, eating well, taking a break from work, engaging in physical activity, mindfulness, learning to say no, and taking time with family and friends. This project seeks to implement self-care strategies to reduce burnout among nurses. This Projects PICOT question is, "Among nurses in hospital settings (P), does implementing self-care activities (I), compared to not implementing the activities (C), reduce burnout level (O) within 6 months (T)?"

Background of Studies

Pérula-de Torres et al. (2019), and Bezerra et al. (2016) are the quantitative studies chosen to provide relevant evidence for this project on implementing self-care to reduce nursing burnout. Bezerra et al. (2016) sought to examine stress levels and nursing burnout prevalence among nurses in a hospital setting. The article describes nursing burnout, its causes, prevalence, and implications for patient care and nursing practice generally. Bezerra et al. (2016) further recommend suitable self-care strategies to prevent burnout among nurses, making them valuable in nursing as they provide a reliable solution to deal with the prevalent nursing burnout. The study limited its scope to nursing burnout within a hospital context during day and night shifts. The research question is: what are the levels and prevalence of nursing burnout syndrome on night and day shifts in a hospital setting?

Pérula-de Torres et al. (2019) find health professionals to be at increased risk of work-related stress and burnout because of emotional and psychological job demands and other organizational aspects. This study aimed at examining the effectiveness of self-compassion and mindfulness interventions to reduce burnout and work stress in community and family medicine and among educators. The findings of this study add valuable knowledge to nursing practice by establishing the effectiveness of the identified self-care interventions in solving burnout problems. The study question is, "What is the impact of a self-compassion training program and mindfulness on burnout and work stress levels in tutors and residents of Family and Community Nursing and Medicine?"

How do these two articles support the nursing practice problem you chose?

Pérula-de Torres et al. (2019) and Bezerra et al. (2016) are relevant to nursing burnout and provide detailed evidence about the problem, its prevalence, and its implications in nursing practice. For instance, Bezerra et al. (2016) looked at the prevalence of nursing burnout and stress among nurses working in hospitals. The causes, frequency, and effects of nursing burnout on patient care and nursing practice in general are discussed in the article. Further, suggests appropriate self-care techniques to prevent nursing burnout. Pérula-de Torres et al. (2019) find mindfulness programs to be effective in reducing burnout, and their incorporation into the training plan and curriculum is more appropriate and easier to accomplish. These findings are useful and resourceful for the project on burnout prevention. The PICOT study will have both control and intervention groups, similar to Pérula-de Torres et al. (2019), where there were three groups: Experimental Group-4, Experimental Group-8, and Control Group (CG), with each having 44 participants; however, the PICOT study completely differs from Bezerra et al. (2016), which obtained data from different sources to identify burnout prevalence levels among nursing professionals.

Method of Study

Bezerra et al. (2016) used a descriptive cross-sectional design with a quantitative approach. Data was collected from 118 nurses through the Maslach Burnout Inventory—Human Services Survey. The quantitative research method used is to analyze the data gathered is descriptive analysis (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences version 20.0). Pérula-de Torres et al. (2019) used a multicentre cluster randomized controlled trial study design with three equivalent sections. The study involved 132 participants, equally distributed across the three study groups. A descriptive cross-sectional study involves obtaining data about a condition and its associated factors at a specific point in time. In this method, data is obtained at the same time. However, cluster randomized controlled trials involve randomized controlled trials where clusters, or preexisting groups of people, for instance nurses, patients, and administrators, are allocated treatment arms randomly.

The cluster randomized controlled trial provides more logical convenience and is generally received with higher acceptability when provided to the entire population compared to at the individual level. However, the method is more complex in analysis and design and requires more subjects to get the same statistical power. Cross-sectional design is easy to conduct and less costly, but the design cannot examine human behavior over time and is not effective in determining cause-and-effect relationships.

Results of Studies

Bezerra et al. (2016) established burnout syndrome as a prevalent nursing practice during both night and day shifts in a hospital context. Pérula-de Torres et al. (2019) found the mindfulness program to be an effective intervention for reducing work-related stress and burnout. The intervention in this study is easier and more fitting to incorporate into training plans and curriculum. Moreover, the intervention is widely accepted in primary care settings because it is less costly in terms of the required resources for its implementation. These findings are important for nursing practice as they describe the burnout problem and provide reliable evidence on how nursing practice can address the rising occurrence of burnout in the healthcare system.

Ethical Considerations

One of the most important ethical factors is informed consent, since it guarantees that a potential participant is adequately informed and willingly decides to participate in the study. The participant's informed consent serves as evidence of their consent to participate. Second, the researcher must guarantee that volunteers won't suffer any bodily, emotional, or psychic harm. Before beginning the two investigations, the researchers obtained the subjects' informed consent. This demonstrated that the participants had agreed to take part in the study on their own initiative and that they were aware of the procedure and the expected results (Dickert et al., 2020). The research was also given the go-ahead by the appropriate ethics committees to make sure it conformed with all requirements and did not endanger the participants.

Conclusion

The two articles followed scientific research methodology to study nursing burnout syndrome and self-care strategies to address the burnout. The study articles are resourceful in providing evidence that provides a solid background and support relating to the PICOT question. While the first study identified and supported the frequency of nurse burnout it also study levels of stress and self-care practices as prevention measures. The second study focuses on how mindfulness and self-compassion training programs effect levels of stress and reduce burnout among healthcare workers. Moreover, the studies complied with ethical research principles to provide valid, reliable, and highly generalizable study findings.

References

Bezerra, C. M. B., & De Martino, M. M. F. (2016). Stress and burnout syndrome in hospital nurses: a descriptive study. Online Brazilian Journal of Nursing, 15, 518-520. https://www.objnursing.uff.br/index.php/nursing/article/view/5525/pdf_1

Dickert, N. W., Bernard, A. M., Brabson, J. M., Hunter, R. J., McLemore, R., Mitchell, A. R., ...& D. Pentz, R. (2020). Partnering with patients to bridge gaps in consent for acute careresearch. The American Journal of Bioethics, 20(5), 7-17. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15265161.2020.1745931

Pérula-de Torres, L. A., Atalaya, J. C. V. M., García-Campayo, J., Roldán-Villalobos, A., Magallón-Botaya, R., Bartolomé-Moreno, C., ... & collaborative group of the MINDUUDD study. (2019). Controlled clinical trial comparing the effectiveness of a mindfulness and self-compassion 4-session programme versus an 8-session programme to reduce work stress and burnout in family and community medicine physicians and nurses: MINDUUDD study protocol.  BMC family practice, 20, 1-10. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6364464/