Womens Views about Management and Cause of Urinary Tract Infection - Book Report/Review Example

 Research Paper Critique Report Table of Contents Table of Contents 1 Title 2 Abstract 2 Research Design 2 Hypothesis 3 Importance of the Research Paper 4 Literature Review 4 Sampling 5 Restrictions 7 Research Ethics 7 Data Collection, Analysis and Presentation 7 8 References 9 Title The research paper title is “Women’s Views about Management and Cause of Urinary Tract Infection: A Qualitative Interview Study”. The research paper contents; abstract, introduction, methods and results, are well articulated in addition to reflecting on the title of the paper well. Abstract The abstract if the research paper is very well presented and briefly highlights the important milestones of the paper in addition to creating a clear picture of what is contained in the paper. It is broken-down into the processes followed in its preparation. The objectives, research design, the targeted population setting, the sample, results and conclusions are well captured. However, the abstract fails in that, it does not capture the advantages of the design technique followed and the size of the target population which to form the study sample. In an ideal situation, the abstract will give the total population and the sample so as to make it clear to the reader that the requirements of sampling techniques were followed for the research findings to attain the required scientific rigor. Two important parts have been left out in the abstract and they include the data collection part and key words part. The data collection part will highlight the research data collection tool; either it was a questionnaire, interview, observations, document observations etc. This forms an integral part of the research study in that the validity and reliability of any research paper lies on the data collected, the sampling technique, the sample and the way the results are presented. Key words are also very key in any research document as it is the leading light and helps create a better understanding of the research work by first creating an impression in the reader’s mind of what to expect in the paper. Research Design The researcher used qualitative research design and employed the use of a qualitative interview to collect the data. This kind of technique is used in instances where the researcher wanted to get the opinions and understandings of the participants. The design is advantageous in that the research is able to get more detailed information from the participant in addition to the participant participating in the research process fully. In this case, the participants were allowed to volunteer topics of their liking and experiences on the research subject. According to Patrick Steve (2005), this is an important procedure in qualitative research as it brings out the willingness from the participants to participate in addition to uplifting their morale and reporting rate. In this stage, the research objective was the guiding light. As Crotty (1998) puts it, proper utilization of research objectives enables the researcher to avoid the committing of un-necessary mistakes and guides him/her to achieve the targets within the specified time and resources. Hypothesis The research study has no hypothesis formulated. However, the following hypothesis statements should have been formulated. H0: Women with urinary tract infection do not accept different strategies for managing the infection, including delayed use antibiotics and the cause of the infection H1: Women with urinary tract infection accept different strategies for managing the infection, including delayed use antibiotics and the cause of the infection H0: Experiences of first-time mothers at home are the same as those for first-time mothers at hospital Or H0: Women with urinary tract infection do not accept delayed use antibiotics H1: Women with urinary tract infection accept delayed use antibiotics Or H0: Women with urinary tract infection do not accept the causes of the infection H1: Women with urinary tract infection accept the causes of the infection As Greenfield (2002) puts it, the null hypothesis must always reflect non effect of the research study controls. To Greenfield further, hypothesis statements forms the foundations of the paper and often than not many readers’ focuses on them for complete directions about what led to some actions being undertaken and not others as well as why certain sampling techniques were used as opposed to others. According to Greenfield, hypothesis statements are generally devolved from the research objectives and are meant to ensure that the researcher can produce a document that meets scientific requirements and that captures the reader’s expectations well. Importance of the Research Paper Getting a complete understanding of women’s views on the management of urinary tract infections is important. The importance of this part can be better understood if the objectives, hypothesis and research questions of the paper are properly captured and desegregated into manageable activities which can be implemented through data collection, analysis and results presentation. Further, to Denzin and Lincoln (1994), the importance of a research work is key to many stakeholders which include donors/financiers as well as implementing agencies and should be well captured in manner which can be understood by the reader’s, donors and other relevant stakeholders’. In this research study, the importance of the research work is well captured through the weight given to the procedure and interview process. However, this needs to be well captured and articulated and included as part of the abstract. Literature Review Any research work that fails to make references to other research works fails the test of validity and reliability. Using other research findings strengthens the researcher’s case in that many readers place more weight on the number of writers one has quoted or read. Mostly best research practices are available from other research documents and a researcher should strive to understand their advantages and disadvantages for effective application and future research requests. One important aspect involved in literature review is the comparison of the research findings in with those of other research works. However, not all quotes are valid but those from authors in their areas of specialization. Further, a researcher should be able to come up with tangible sources and if possible avoid the use of internet sources as they change more often and are not an authority. This research paper has fared well in literature review since it has quotes and citations from tangible authors. This is a best practice in research paper writing and affords the paper credibility and following. Sampling As Kaplan (2004), sampling forms an integral part of any research paper in that the research findings draws inferences from the sample and generalizes them to fit the whole population. Using a sample to represent the whole population is advantageous in that the researcher takes less time and spends little funds in order to arrive at the research results unlike the time and resources consumed in a complete count. Both complete count and a sample lead to the same conclusions if the sample fully represented the whole population. According to Kaplan, the researcher questions and hypothesis determine (indicates) to the researcher what the sampling units are. In this case, the objectives clearly state that women with tract infections form the researcher’s sampling frame. In general, a researcher’s sampling technique should always lead to an un-biased sample as it is from such sample that the findings can be generalized to fit the whole population. One of the techniques used mostly in the sampling is the simple random sampling which is employed in cases where the target population has the same traits. For example, in this case, if all the women were form the same cultural history, same socio-economic status, marital status and with the same equivalent attributes. The advantage of this is that it is cheaper as compared to other sampling techniques. This technique cannot be employed in this case since the women were form the same cultural history, same socio-economic status, marital status and with the same equivalent attributes. Another sampling technique and which has been employed in this research study is the stratified sampling where the target population is a combination of women with the tract infection but from different backgrounds. This technique is important and leads to representative sample in that the population of the women is sun-divided into non-overlapping sub-groups based on the management strategies. The technique is advantageous in that all views and opinions on the research study are well captured since random samples are considered in the final results representation. In this case, the researcher also introduced the element of randomization in order to ensure un-biased representation. The only thing missing in the sampling technique is the inclusion of the total target population in order to ensure equal representation. This would have led to the determination of the research sample using the formula, n = N / (1+N (e2)) where n would be the sample size while N would be the sampling units. e would be the error on estimation, mostly, this is assumed to be 0.05. Even without the total population figure, a representative sample can be gotten for the research findings through the use of a complete and exhaustive sampling and data collection process. With a representative sample, the research findings can be generalized to fit the whole population. This is not possible without a representative sample (McHoul and Grace 1993). Restrictions In the determination of a research sample, it is always important to have restrictions imposed on the whole research population. The restrictions should be in such a way that they are aimed at getting a sample that fully represents the whole population. Research ethics contributes much in this area in that, those without the research study condition are not included in the final sample. Further, participants who do not consent to participate by free consent are not included in the research study. According to Kumar, R. (1996), a participant should participate in any research study by free consent and not through coercion. Further, the participants may decide not to participate based on the information provided before the onset of the research study. In this case, for one to be eligible to be a participant, he/she had to be taking part in the larger study trial. If you were not taking part, then participation was denied. This was meant to ensure 100% rate of interview participation and precision of the results. Research Ethics The following ethical practices are important although they were not properly articulated in the research study; Protection of human participants; Justice for all participants; Information to all the participants research benefits; Research participants making informed decisions on their participation; and Confidentiality of collected data. Data Collection, Analysis and Presentation Qualitative interviews were used as data collection tools for this research study. In analysis, descriptive statistics and qualitative analysis were done to gain a deeper understanding of the research results. The findings are presented through the use of tables and qualitative reports. Tables are mostly used in data representation since they are fast to understand even to non-statisticians. References Patrick McNeill and Steve Chapman (2005) Research methods 3rd ed. New York, NY: Routledge Crotty, M. (1998). The Foundations of Social Research, Allen and Unwin, Sydney. Greenfield, T (2002) Research methods for postgraduates, Arnold, London. Denzin, N.K. and Lincoln, Y.S. (1994). A Handbook of Qualitative Research. Thousand Oaks, CA : Sage. Denzin, N.K. (1997). Interpretative Ethnography: ethnographic practices for the 21st century. London: Sage. Kaplan, D. (2004). The Sage handbook of quantitative methodology for the social sciences. Thousand Oaks, Calif.; London: Sage Kumar, R. (1996). Research Methodology: a step by step guide for beginners. London: Sage. McHoul, A. and Grace, W. (1993). A Foucault primer: discourse, power and the subject, Melbourne University Press, Melbourne. Norris, C. (2002), Deconstruction, 3rd edn, Routledge, London. Silverman, D. (2001). Interpreting qualitative data: methods for analyzing talk, text, and interaction. 2nd ed. London ; Thousand Oaks, Calif. : Sage Publications Yin, R.K. (2003). Case study research: design and methods. 3rd ed. Thousand Oaks, Calif. : Sage Publications Read More