Paper
Thursday, 20 July 2006
This presentation is part of : Initiatives to Create an Evidence-Based Nursing Environment
Assessing Evidence-Based Practice Among Staff Nurses in Rural Community Hospitals
Helen K. Burns, PhD, RN, School of Nursing, Center for Research in Chronic Disorders, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, USA and Susan M. Foley, PhD, RN, Research Assistant Professor, Center for Research in Chronic Disorders, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, USA.
Learning Objective #1: The learner will be able to describe a methodology for assessing evidence-based practice among staff nurses.
Learning Objective #2: The learner will be able to describe key elements associated with the adoption of evidence-based practice among rural community hospital nurses.
Research in the area of evidence-based practice (EBP) has focused mainly on implementation models, barriers and facilitators to implementation, and individual implementation studies. A vast majority of this research has been conducted among nurses in the urban hospital setting.  Less common is research conducted among nurses in rural healthcare settings.  Yet, nurses working in rural health care facilities encounter unique problems in their ability to implement EBP including availability of research findings and communication technology.  Additionally, nurses working in rural facilities tend to be older, change jobs less often, and have fewer years of formal nursing education.  It is less likely that these nurses have heard of EBP or had a research course in their non-baccalaureate education and therefore continue to provide nursing care based on established routine.  Furthermore, the research literature suggests that an “unspoken assumption” exists that if clinicians have the available information, they will take action; this has not been the case.  Although clinical nurses recognize the need for EBP, few have used research findings in practice and limited evidence is available to suggest that research findings directly affect the quality of patient care. Collaborations among academicians, researchers, clinicians, and administrators have been supported as an effective method of fostering EBP implementation in rural facilities.  Therefore, as an initial step in an academic-practice partnership between a School of Nursing and three rural community hospitals, a survey was administered among nurses (N=382) to determine factors affecting adoption of EBP.  This presentation will provide results of this survey including a demographic picture of rural nurses, sources of practice knowledge, use of the steps of the EBP process in clinical practice, self-rating of current ability to practice EBP, and rural nurses’ outlook on EBP in clinical practice. 

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See more of The 17th International Nursing Research Congress Focusing on Evidence-Based Practice (19-22 July 2006)