DQ 1
PICOT is utilized by the health care community to identify and study a nursing or medical practice
problem. Consequently, PICOT examples that may provide insight into the use of the PICOT process, may
not be relevant to nursing practice as they are based on a medical practice problem.
Describe the difference between a nursing practice problem and a medical practice problem.
Nursing practice problems deal with modalities of patient care such as support, comfort, prevention of
trauma, promotion of recovery, health screening, appraisal and/or assessment, health education, and
coordination of health care. A medical diagnosis deals with disease or medical condition. A nursing
diagnosis deals with human response to actual or potential health problems and life processes
(Flemming, 2007). Medical practice problem is the condition or what plagues the patient while nursing
practice problem is how the patient is responding or dealing with the condition.
For example, a medical diagnosis of Cerebrovascular Attack (CVA or Stroke) provides information about
the patient’s pathology. The complimentary nursing diagnoses of Impaired verbal communication, risk
for falls, risk for aspiration, interrupted family processes and powerlessness provide a more holistic
understanding of the impact of that stroke on this particular patient and his family; these also dictated
nursing interventions to obtain patient-specific outcomes (NANDA International, n.d.).
A PICOT question should be based on a nursing practice problem because it directly helps the nurse
specify a problem concerning patient that needs addressing. If properly addressed, may help increase
the outcome of that specific population.
References
Flemming, W. J., (2007
). Selecting a Clinical Nursing Problem for Research
. Retrieved August 27, 2019,
from
NANDA International. (n.d.).
Defining the knowledge of nursing
. Retrieved August 27, 2019, from
-
nursing-diagnosis-.html
DQ 2
Nursing research is used to study a dilemma or a problem in nursing. Provide rational and support for
your answer.
Examine a problem you have seen in nursing.
Provide an overview of the problem and discuss why the problem should be studied.
A problem I have witnessed on my unit and the place where I work is that when there aren’t staffing
shortages, the staff are being flexed (sent home early and other people taking over their workload)
which of course leaves the current staff in a bind for the rest of the day. “In addition to the higher patient
