Nursing Research
Research Implementation Phase
As mentioned earlier in the paper, in order to answer the five main research questions formulated for this research paper, four different types of data collection methods will be utilized; namely, secondary research of existing literature and primary research (survey-based questionnaires, interviews and direct observation). The implementation phase will include a brief overview of how the project will be executed on-ground, the expenditures that will be needed, as well as how the process of data analysis will be conducted.
Project Schedule and Timeframe
Tentatively, it is estimated that the research project’s completion, including the compilation of the data analysis results will require between four to six weeks. The basic secondary research to determine the important population variables and healthcare trends among the elderly population (who have had relapses and readmissions in the last 3 years), has already been completed. This data (explained in the Literature Review section of the paper) formed the basis for developing the interview questions for the elderly populations, as well as the survey questionnaires distributed amongst the Transitional Nursing staff .
As such, the project has been sub-divided into seven stages of implementation, each with a specified start and end time (fixed duration), as well as a single point of focus. The starting point is the background research into the developing role of the field of Transitional Nursing in order to better understand how transitional nursing professionals can help the elderly population (60 years of age and above) in America.
This is followed by actual fieldwork by identifying the health care facilities (hospitals, out-patient treatment centers and community/welfare medical institutes) where the elderly population receives treatment/medical help. This in turn is followed up with in-person interactions with the research subjects. However, it is important to first set a criteria for determining which of the elderly population must be included in the sample to be interviewed. Due to time and resource constraints, the medical staff at the chosen healthcare facilities will be asked to provide a list of people who will best be able to answer the questions developed, while also ensuring that their privacy rights are not violated .
Once the interviews have been completed successfully, the questionnaires that were developed will be printed out and distributed among the transitional nursing staff at the aforementioned facilities.
The respondents will be given two options. Either the researcher will arrive with the questionnaire at a facility at a pre-decided time and administer the survey in a room to groups of transitional nurses. The advantage here will be that the researcher will be present in person to explain any confusions that the respondents may have in filling out the questionnaires, thereby reducing the chances of incorrectly answered questions or blanks, both of which affect the integrity of the data collected. The other option is for the questionnaires to be left with the staff and collected at an agreed upon time a day later. This may give the respondents more time to think about the open-ended questions included in the survey with no time deadline causing stress . However, the chances of the questionnaires not being filled are higher; a higher non-response rate in a research not only affects the data gathered, but will also lead to resource wastage.
Once interviews with 50 members of the elderly population (determined sample size) are complete and the 100 questionnaires given out to transitional nurses have been collected, the data gathering stage of the project is complete. The next step is compiling the information and categorizing it so that descriptive statistical analysis can be used to draw inferences and answer the research questions. Once the statistical analysis is complete, the results will be compiled and presented (using charts and tables when needed), in order to establish how Transitional Nursing has the unrealized potential of improving the health and well-being of the elderly population, while also reducing the burden of medical expenses for the state.
An important factor mentioned in the table that requires an explanation is the fact that there is no end date specified for the observation part of the data collection stage. This is because both direct and indirect observation of the research subjects and their interactions with the transitional nurses will continue for the duration of the project. Findings of these observations will form an integral part of the data analysis and results presentation stages of the project .
The table below presents an overview of the implementation phase, from the starting point till the end:
This research project will be completed and be ready for discussion and presentation by February 13. However, since actual research projects always encounter unavoidable delays, a buffer time margin of five days has been allocated. This implies that if all goes well, the timeline depicted above will be met, however if it takes longer than projected (mainly the data collection stage of the project), then an additional five days will be added to the project timeline. This in turn will extend the end of the project to February 18.
Budgetary Allocations
Developing a budget for a research project is a crucial step and needs to be undertaken with a great deal of attention and scrutiny. In most cases, it is the Data Collection stage that requires the greatest allocation of resources, followed by the results presentation stage .
The total budget that will be required to execute the project will range between a hundred and a hundred and twenty dollars. Several welfare institutions working for the elderly will be contacted to help raise these funds, on-campus drives and online crowdsourcing campaigns. Any discrepancy not met from these sources will be funded through out-of-pocket expenses of the researcher.
Statistical Resources and Analysis
Descriptive statistics work on the premise of simplifying large amounts of complex data into manageable, understandable forms. In a way, descriptive statistics summarize the data that has been gathered in order to make generalizations from a sample about an entire population segment. This definition might indicate that descriptive statistics may lead the researcher to state results that may not hold true for every member of the population that was sampled. Despite this, particularly for medical researches, descriptive analysis is useful in identifying links and relationships between research variables, make comparisons and establish trends. Of course, it is best to follow-up descriptive analysis with inferential statistics to improve data accuracy and the general application of the research results .
In this project, Univariate Analysis will be performed on the data collected. This involved analyzing a single research variable, such as the number of years an elderly individual has suffered from a chronic disease, along three dimensions which are:
The Frequency Distribution (research results depicted via bar graphs and histograms)
Measures of Central Tendency (calculating the mean, median and mode of data points)
Dispersion (calculating the range and standard deviation of the data collected to determine the accuracy of results)
References
Arnold, L. D. (2013). Statistical Trends in the Journal of the American Medical Association and Implications for Training across the Continuum of Medical Education. Journal of Biomedical Research, 13-23.
Desbiens, N. A. (2016). The reporting of statistics in medical educational studies: an observational study. BMC Medical Research Methodology, 7-35.
Strasak, A. M. (2014). Statistical errors in medical research – a review of common pitfalls. Journal of Ethics in Medical Research, 44-59.
