Determining The Credibility Of Evidence And Resources Sample Paper

The third step of evidence-based practice involves critical appraisal of the sources of the evidence. This ensures their worthiness for application in practice. This worthiness can alternatively be assessed by assessing the credibility of these sources. The credibility of the evidence sources implies that the evidence can be related well to reality and that the truth in the findings can be demonstrated. In the previous step, a diagnosis of acute pneumonia was selected for evidence-based search on the diagnosis process. In this paper, the credibility of the sources that would be assembled will be elaborated and the criteria explained.

Description of the Diagnosis

The new nurse had difficulty in the process of coming up with a diagnosis in a patient with acute chest pain and productive cough. The guidelines for making clinical diagnoses have been improved with time and vary with the setting of clinical practice. The new nurse would benefit from evidence-based practice to establish the best criterion to apply in the diagnostic process. Four databases were identified for the literature search: PubMed, Cochrane Library, google scholar, CINAHL, and PsycINFO.

Literature Search

The literature search was done using the entry of key terms which included ‘pneumonia diagnosis’, ‘pneumonia guidelines’, and ‘pneumonia protocols.’ The search was enhanced by the use of Boolean operators that included ‘OR’ and “AND” to include the relevant search returns. Filters were also applied to improve the relevance of the articles. The search results were filtered based on the publication dates where only articles published in the past five years were returned. Five articles were selected from the returned search results. The selection was based on the relevance of their topics to the issue, diagnosis of pneumonia.

Credibility Strategies and Criteria

The selected five sources were Doubravská et al., 2018; Grief & Loza, 2018; Jain et al., 2021; Perez et al., 2017; and Peterson, 2020. These in-text citations have their full reference provided in the references section of this paper. Various factors were used to assess the credibility of these sources

By the fact that the resources were retrieved from renowned databases mentioned earlier, assumptions were made that they had been peer-reviewed before publication thus credible per the peer reviewers. PubMed and other databases aforementioned are reputable journals that provide scholarly and peer-reviewed journal articles (Cooper et al., 2018). The structure of the resources assured their credibility. There were other criteria such as relevance, authority, and timeliness that were considered in the assessment of the credibility of these sources.

The search ensured that articles published in the past five years were selected for providing the evidence for making the diagnosis. This ensured timeliness in the evidence quality. The practice is dynamic and thus the older evidence may not be the best for application into practice. The authority of the evidence is determined by the authors or the publishers of the evidence. Individuals or organizations that have the authority to speak or write on a given subject are best placed to provide the best authoritative evidence in that field.

In this search, the authors’ information was checked before their selection for use. Most of the authors for the five resources were authored or published by nurses or medical specialists in their respective subfields of medical practice. This made the evidence that would be retrieved from these resources more authoritative thus credible (Sbaffi & Rowley, 2017). The contents of the evidence were cross-checked for structure and language that could distinguish from mere blogs that are usually considered less credible (König & Jucks, 2020). The language and content were professional in these resources

Importance of Incorporating Credible Evidence into an EBP Model

Credible evidence is trustable and can be applied without doubt into clinical practice. In this context, the nurse wants to make the diagnosis of a patient who probably has pneumonia. However, she does not have the necessary EBP acumen to obtain the necessary evidence. In the absence of credible sources, she may end up choosing other differential diagnoses as the primary clinical impressions.

Incorporating credible evidence into evidence-based practice greatly influences health care decisions and outcomes (Sillence et al., 2019). These are mainly seen in patient safety and quality of care. Making the best diagnosis is safer for the patient because the necessary care is provided in time the risk of development of complications of progression of the illness is reduced or halted in the best-case scenarios.

Conclusion

Making accurate and timely diagnoses promotes patient care safety and efficiency. In the case scenario, the nurse sought the next guideline that is evidence-based and current. The process incorporated the EBP model that started with the identification of the topic, diagnosis of pneumonia. Sources of the evidence were identified and included major nursing and health-related databases.

The literature search was done and various items were used to ascertain the credibility of these sources. Timeliness, authority, and relevance were the main criteria for determining the credibility of the sources. The resources were younger than five years, published by nurses or specialists in their respective fields, and maintained topical relevance to their topics. Therefore, all were considered credible.

References:

• Cooper, C., Booth, A., Varley-Campbell, J., Britten, N., & Garside, R. (2018). Defining the process to literature searching in systematic reviews: a literature review of guidance and supporting studies. BMC Medical Research Methodology, 18(1), 85. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12874-018-0545-3
• König, L., & Jucks, R. (2020). Effects of positive language and profession on trustworthiness and credibility in online health advice: Experimental study. Journal of Medical Internet Research, 22(3), e16685. https://doi.org/10.2196/16685
• Sbaffi, L., & Rowley, J. (2017). Trust and credibility in Web-based health information: A review and agenda for future research. Journal of Medical Internet Research, 19(6), e218. https://doi.org/10.2196/jmir.7579
• Sillence, E., Blythe, J. M., Briggs, P., & Moss, M. (2019). A revised model of trust in internet-based health information and advice: Cross-sectional questionnaire study.