Registered nurses are the largest group of health care professionals in the United States. With developments in technology and the restructuring of medical institutions to more efficiently meet the needs of patients, the employment undertaken by this workforce of 2.9 million is subject to constant change.
Researchers have started to describe the general development of nursing science as a transition from intuition-based practices to evidence-based practices. This shift from reliance on anecdotal evidence and the directives of senior clinicians toward conducting careful empirical studies has had a significant impact on the ways in which research is conducted.
Some nursing researchers carry out controlled studies and statistical analyses to establish the efficacy of a particular treatment or initiative. Publications in the field also focus on topics such as clinical procedures, the effectiveness of interventions directed toward health awareness and evaluations of the role of nurses as community health educators. University Nursing Prof. Sarah Farrell emphasized the importance of "training nursing scientists" by having students read medical literature critically, citing proper application of the scientific method as the most effective means of establishing standard clinical practices. Farrell described the research-directed nursing paradigm as one in which quantitative studies are conducted by researchers and published in peer-reviewed journals.
These studies are available for consultation by virtually any medical institution, and they often demonstrate changes in policy. "It's a fairly new model as there used to be a 10-year lag time," Farrell said, explaining the "Internet has become an invaluable tool for disseminating information among medical professionals."
Farrell expanded upon this point by describing a particular North Carolina-based nursing study in support of a public health initiative.
Farrell said the 2002 study, published in the Journal of American Dietetic Association, measured the health benefits of regular physical activity in children and was used as evidence to substantiate the importance of physical education in public schools, thereby preserving many such programs from budget cuts or termination.
"All of the interventions [treatment procedures] we're doing, we're really looking into them," third-year Nursing student Skyler Bivens said, referring to the scrupulous research which justifies the best-practice procedures defined in the nursing curriculum. She explained nursing educators place significant emphasis on the importance of empirically supported treatment and the relevance of scientific studies to all aspects of health care.
"People think of medical research as a bunch of scientists wearing goggles and looking into test tubes, but that's not the whole picture," Bivens said.
As for the future of nursing research, Farrell underscored the value of continued research in community health promotion and the search for more scientific "ways we can look at a child's quality of life, ... ways we can look at quality of life for all kinds of vulnerable populations." It is important to recognize medicine is a changing field, and as these changes occur it is important that both the instruction and practices of nursing adhere to a regulated set of standards.
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