CourseworkEvidence-based practice

evaluating a nursing practice environment to identify a nursing problem in the clinical area DQ

Six research articles are required and the question is reused in later assignments, which makes searchability the selection criterion rather than how interesting the problem feels.

Editorial process

Last reviewed · August 22, 2026

Written by

Maren Caldwell

MSN, RN, CNE

Medical-surgical nursing, pharmacology and NCLEX preparation

Reviewed by

Dr. Tessa Redmond

DNP, RN, CNE

Evidence-based practice and clinical education

On this page

Interpret the task
Assignment instructions
Deliverables
Proposed outline
Research plan
Reference shortlist
Final review

Six research articles is the selection criterion

Choose the problem for what you can find evidence about, because six peer-reviewed research articles is a real constraint and the question travels into later assignments. A problem that matters enormously on your unit but has three papers behind it will make every subsequent assignment harder, so run a quick search before committing. Then follow the order the brief gives, which is population first. Starting from the population rather than from the intervention prevents the commonest failure, which is a question built around a solution you already like, and it also produces a bounded group: adults on mechanical ventilation in a medical intensive care unit, or patients over sixty-five admitted from the emergency department after a fall. Notice that both of those name a setting as well as a group, which is what makes the search terms fall out of the population rather than having to be invented.

Build the PICOT carefully, because each element does work later. The comparison is the element most often left out, and current practice is a legitimate comparator that should be described rather than implied. The outcome must be measurable and should already be collected if possible, since an outcome nobody records cannot be studied without adding a data collection burden. The timeframe should be realistic for the outcome to move, which is a different judgement for a pressure injury rate than for a readmission rate. Then treat the article requirement precisely: the brief says research articles, which means original studies reporting methods and results, not editorials, clinical overviews or guidelines, however authoritative those are. Six is enough to include a range of designs, and having at least one systematic review and one qualitative study strengthens the table, but every entry has to report a study you can describe by design, sample and finding.

Likely learning objectives

Select a problem for which sufficient research evidence exists.
Build a PICOT starting from the population rather than the intervention.
Choose an outcome that is measurable and already collected where possible.
Distinguish research articles from other authoritative sources.

Assignment instructions

Read the full question

Review every instruction before using the planning guidance that follows.

The first step of the evidence-based practice process is to evaluate a nursing practice environment to identify a nursing problem in the clinical area. When a nursing problem is discovered, the nurse researcher develops a clinical guiding question to address that nursing practice problem. For this assignment, you will create a clinical guiding question know as a PICOT question. The PICOT question must be relevant to a nursing practice problem. To support your PICOT question, identify six supporting peer-revised research articles, as indicated below. The PICOT question and six peer-reviewed research articles you choose will be utilized for subsequent assignments. Use the “Literature Evaluation Table” to complete this assignment. Select a nursing practice problem of interest to use as the focus of your research. Start with the patient population and identify a clinical problem or issue that arises from the patient population. In 200–250 words, provide a summary of the clinical issue. Following the PICOT format, write a PICOT question in your selected nursing practice problem area of interest. The PICOT question should be applicable to your proposed capstone project (the project students must complete during their final course in the RN-BSN program of study). The PICOT question will provide a framework for your capstone project. Conduct a literature search to locate six research articles focused on your selected nursing practice problem of interest. This literature search should include three quantitative and three qualitative peer-reviewed research articles to support your nursing practice problem. Note: To assist in your search, remove the words qualitative and quantitative and include words that narrow or broaden your main topic. For example: Search for diabetes and pediatric and dialysis. To determine what research design was used in the articles the search produced, review the abstract and the methods section of the article. The author will provide a description of data collection using qualitative or quantitative methods. Systematic Reviews, Literature Reviews, and Meta Analysis articles are good resources and provide a strong level of evidence but are not considered primary research articles. Therefore, they should not be included in this assignment. While APA style is not required for the body of this assignment, solid academic writing is expected, and documentation of sources should be presented using APA formatting guidelines, which can be found in the APA Style Guide, located in the Student Success Center. This assignment uses a rubric. Please review the rubric prior to beginning the assignment to become familiar with the expectations for successful completion.

Course-wide instructions that accompany this question

You must proofread your paper. But do not strictly rely on your computer’s spell-checker and grammar-checker; failure to do so indicates a lack of effort on your part and you can expect your grade to suffer accordingly. Papers with numerous misspelled words and grammatical mistakes will be penalized. Read over your paper – in silence and then aloud – before handing it in and make corrections as necessary. Often it is advantageous to have a friend proofread your paper for obvious errors. Handwritten corrections are preferable to uncorrected mistakes. Use a standard 10 to 12 point (10 to 12 characters per inch) typeface. Smaller or compressed type and papers with small margins or single-spacing are hard to read. It is better to let your essay run over the recommended number of pages than to try to compress it into fewer pages. Likewise, large type, large margins, large indentations, triple-spacing, increased leading (space between lines), increased kerning (space between letters), and any other such attempts at “padding” to increase the length of a paper are unacceptable, wasteful of trees, and will not fool your professor. The paper must be neatly formatted, double-spaced with a one-inch margin on the top, bottom, and sides of each page. When submitting hard copy, be sure to use white paper and print out using dark ink. If it is hard to read your essay, it will also be hard to follow your argument.

Turn the brief into deliverables

01A nursing practice problem identified from a practice environment.
02A bounded patient population.
03A complete PICOT question with a described comparator.
04A 200 to 250 word summary of the clinical issue.
05Six peer-reviewed research articles in the Literature Evaluation Table.
06Each entry describable by design, sample and finding.