Acuity of patients in a hospital - Essay Example

Acuity of patients in a hospital Clinical Questions Finding evidence to support a changing practice and the overall patient outcomes is a key part in the work of a nurse. This depends on how the questions the nurse, will ask are formulated. The two types of clinical questions are foreground and background questions. Foreground questions are specific, relevant questions. They are will be asked in order to determine, which interventions are most appropriate. Background questions, on the other hand, are broader and will be asked so as to provide general knowledge (Overholt, 2005).

The above kinds of questions are better asked in a PICOT format. PICOT stands for: population (P), intervention (I), comparison (C), outcome (O), and (T) for the time, it takes an intervention to produce an outcome. This format is significant because it is a systematic way for identifying clinical issue components. The following is my PICOT statement for my capstone, which I will use to analyze the issue of acuity (Overholt, 2005). The issues in question are the following, the high number patients in the unit, frequency of the occurrence of cardiac arrests, unplanned admissions in the ICU, and rapid response teams.

Here, my issue of interest will be the rapid response team. This will be in correspondence to lack of a rapid response teams and failure to have a method for addressing emergencies thus; the element for comparison is no rapid response team. The outcomes will be the heart attacks and unexpected ICU admissions. Other could be deaths and duration of stay Therefore, the PICOT question is: (P) in admitted adults, (I) how is the team for rapid response in comparison with no team at all (C) affect the number of heart attacks (0) and unexpected ICU admissions during a period of three months (Overholt, 2005).

References Overholt, E. (2005). Asking compelling questions. Philadelphia: Wolters Kluwer Health.