| Learning Objective #1: Define overall themes related to sources of knowledge from narrative data and create a taxonomy of sources | |||
| Learning Objective #2: Profile each unit’s sources of knowledge structure and patterns and describe a common structure of knowledge sources |
Literature on nurses’ knowledge sources has traditionally promoted the use of sources such as academic journals to increase research utilization. This is premised on the researchers’ perceptions of the sources as “ideal” in bridging the “theory-practice gap.” However, this perception differs radically from the nurses’ knowledge sources in practice. This study examines nurses' use of scientific and related kinds of knowledge.
Objectives: The objectives of the study were to: (a) define overall themes related to sources of knowledge from narrative data, (b) create a taxonomy of sources, (c) profile each unit’s sources of knowledge structure and patterns, and (d) describe a common structure of knowledge sources.
Design, methods, population, sample, and setting: Ethnographic case study design and methods are used to collect and analyze data from seven pediatric and adult units with surgical patients in Ontario and Alberta. Data sources for the analyses included interviews, focus groups, participant observations, unit based documents, and several quantitative surveys.
Findings, conclusions, and implications: Across the seven nursing units, nurses rely more on social interaction as a source of practice knowledge, and less on traditional academic sources (journals). These social interactions can be categorized as informal (for instance, between nurses and other nurses, nurses and other professionals, and nurses and non-professionals), or formal (conferences, in-service, and meetings). In terms of knowledge transfer, the most important of these interactions are those between nurses and their peers. These findings are consistent with those from quantitative analyses of the same data. In the latter case the overall trend emerging from cross-unit comparisons is that nurses rely more on social interactions, personal experience, and individual patient information. We believe that these findings have implications for research utilization in so far as they provide clues on viable media for research knowledge dissemination among nurses.
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