A trend of high level of non-compliance with treatment regimens among Hispanic patients has been observed in our organization over the last three months. Many Hispanic patients attending the facility fail to observe the prescriptions given to them. This lack of compliance is mainly common among the Hispanic patients suffering from diabetes type 2. Non adherence to treatment regimens is a serious concern to nursing care in various ways. First, people who fail to adhere to medication regimens are more likely than their counterparts who comply with treatment recommendations to be readmitted to the hospital. Secondly, it is important to note that full benefits of the nursing care cannot be realized without full compliance with the care recommendations. Besides, non-compliance can result in adverse event or poor care outcome. Diabetes patients attending the facility are educated on proper lifestyle changes and nutritional practices needed to help in the management of the condition. However, the level of non-compliance with these recommendations remains high among the Hispanic patients. It turns out that many Hispanic patients trust their family members and seek health-related advice from them. In some cases, patients choose to observe advice given by family members instead of that given by the nurses. Therefore, there is the need investigate whether nursing education of family members in addition to educating the patients would help in promoting compliance.
Evidence on the above topic can be obtained from the relevant literature. The process of searching for the nursing literature for evidence involves various steps. The first step is the formulation of a clinical question (Bartkowiak, 2005). In this case, the following PICO would be appropriate: in diabetic patients of Hispanic origin, does educating family members of the patients on proper lifestyle and dietary practices compared to educating the patients only decrease the level of non-compliance? The next step involves the identification of the appropriate information resources to search. There are various nursing resources from where evidence can be searched. For instance, PubMed Cochrane library, and EBSCOHOST provide a wide range of literature that can help address the topic. The next step involves the actual execution of the evidence search. In this case, search term is first developed. One of the appropriate search terms for this study would be the following: educating family members improve medication adherence. From the search term developed, appropriate keywords are derived. Based on the search term stated above, the following keywords can be derived: educating, family members improve, and medication adherence. Another possible search term would be the following: caregiver education improves patient adherence to treatment regimen. The keywords that can be derived from this search term include the following: caregiver, education, improves, and patient adherence to treatment regimens. Sources can be further subjected to certain exclusion or inclusion criteria before the most appropriate is picked. For instance, they can be excluded or included on the basis of when they were published. In this case, sources published within a given time are picked and evidence derived from it. I would appraise the evidence obtained on the basis of the 7 levels of evidence ranked by polite and Beck (cited in Hood, 2013, p. 250).
References
Bartkowiak, B. A. (2005). Searching for evidence-based medicine in the literature part 2: resources. Clinical medicine & research, 3(1), 39-40.
Hood, L. (2013). Leddy & Pepper's conceptual bases of professional nursing. Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.
