The 10 ‘R’s of safe multidisciplinary drug administration

Nurses are responsible for medication administration, and, as with many other nursing interventions, some risk is involved. If an error occurs, a patient may suffer harm or injury, which may lead to a permanent disability or a fatality. To ensure safe drug administration, nurses are encouraged to follow the five rights (‘R’s; patient, drug, route, time and dose) of medication administration to prevent errors in administration. The five ‘R’s do not consider all causes of drug errors; instead, they focus on medication administration at the bedside so they relate only to this stage of a drug prescription. A drug’s journey is more than what happens at the bedside; therefore, the reduction of errors requires more than just the five ‘R’s. This article proposes a multi-professional, evidence-based approach to medicines management, which all clinicians can work towards, together. Clinicians can achieve this approach by considering the National Patients Safety Agency’s definition of a medication error and the values set out by the National Prescribing Centre. The approach utilizes 10 ‘R’s, which provide a benchmark for good practice. The 10 ‘Rs’ advocate the need for the knowledge of the causes of drug errors, how to implement strategies to reduce drug errors, how to ensure safe practice throughout the medication journey, from chemical preparation, to monitoring outcomes, to response

Responding to COVID-19 in the National Health Service in England: positive changes and learning for Knowledge for Healthcare

The article provides an overview of the response from the Health Education England library and knowledge services team to the COVID-19 pandemic. The article covers activity and initiatives that were put in place in England from March 2020 to address challenges and issues arising for library and knowledge services delivering to the National Health Service. The article reflects on the learning from the developments that have been implemented to date and considers the positive changes that have arisen in the continued delivery against five national, strategic drivers

Yet another journal! – Is there any need? [Editorial]

Every day we are mercilessly bombarded by emails offering to publish our work in journals of all shades and hues: from the ‘pay for publication’ vanity publishers to the subscription-based traditional journals. So why on earth would we need another journal? What are we playing at? As editors of this journal our long term goal is to be instrumental in enabling the development of an effective and accepted paradigm for evidence-based information systems (EBIS): providing evidence of its value and impact on information systems practice. Drawing on definitions from the health field (Muir Gray, 1997; Sackett, Rosenberg, Gray, Haynes, & Richardson, 1996) we define EBIS as “an approach to decision making in the design, adoption and implementation of information systems that uses the best evidence available, from both practitioner expertise and systematic research, in consultation with all stakeholders”. In 2013, we argued that to achieve EBIS the information systems (IS) community needed to adopt a seven point agenda to provide the foundations for EBIS (B. J. Oates, Wainwright, & Edwards, 2013). Table 1 develops this call and includes an eighth action ‘building the community’

The Effect of Agenda for Change on the Career Progression of the Radiographic Workforce 2009

Report compiled by the University of Hertfordshire in collaboration with the Inst for Employment Studies and Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals NHS Trust for the Society and College of RadiographersFinal Published versio

Openness Underpins Evidence Based Practice in Information Systems

This paper summarises research in progress on developing an evidence based approach in information systems (EBIS). EBIS offers a solution to information systems failures. Openness lies at the heart of EBIS, with open-access publishing and a culture of openness to new ways of working between IS academics and practitioners in the production of the evidence base. The authors have published an EBIS agenda and are developing a roadmap to implement this agenda. Their research activities are aimed at contributing to this roadmap and comprise: (i) setting up the open-access, peer-reviewed ‘Evidence Based Information Systems Journal’ which provides a vehicle to explore open access publishing and a research impact case study; (ii) creating an EBP culture, through establishing research networks; (iii) investigating IS practitioners’ use of resources; (iv) developing a model-driven approach for the analysis and synthesis of qualitative research within systematic literature reviews (SLRs) and using this to conduct an SLR on telehealthcare innovations. The ‘Evidence Based Information Systems journal’ lies at the heart of this research, providing the evidence repository with clear findings to take away and use, a forum to discuss and reflect on the evidence, and thus contributing to creating the paradigm shift to EBIS

The effect of downhill running conditions on muscle damage in recreationally active adults

Background: Downhill running (DR) has been used extensively to investigate recovery from muscle-damaging exercise. There is no consensus on the optimal conditions (duration, severity, intensity) for a DR protocol. The purpose of this research was to determine the most effective DR conditions to induce muscle damage. Methods: The research was comprised a 3x3 within-between participant design. Recreationally active males’ (n = 12) muscle damage was assessed using gold standard indirect markers (force loss and muscle soreness) at baseline, 24 and 48h post one of three DR conditions (a. 45min at -10% gradient b. 45min at -12% c. 30min at -15%). DR was completed on a motorised treadmill at 70% velocity of V̇O2peak achieved during an incremental exercise test to exhaustion. Results: Isometric force (p = .005, ηp2 = 0.45) and muscle soreness (p = .002, ηp2 = 0.49) were impaired 24h post-exercise; no difference (p > .05) was evident between conditions. At 48h the impairments in force loss and muscle soreness were no longer evident (p > .05) across all conditions. There was no difference (p = .82) in HR between the DR conditions. Findings: Independent of duration and gradient all conditions resulted in a similar response in force loss and muscle soreness, indicating muscle damage had occurred. Interestingly, the 30-min protocol produced the same response in less time, without requiring individuals to work at a greater intensity. Therefore, the 30-min condition is suggested as the most appropriate protocol for use in the scientific investigation of muscle damage from DR

Considering the ways in which anti-oppressive practice principles can inform health research

All research that investigates therapeutic practice should be conducted with the aim to develop and support good procedures of inquiry. An anti-oppressive practice approach within health research provides a way to systematically examine research procedures and motivations to increase the potential that the resultant research will yield ethical and just results. In this paper two music therapy researchers consider how anti-oppressive practices can address real life problems and be applicable to real life situations; from questions of participation, to developing the research question, recruitment, consent, and further steps of the research process. The goal of this paper is to examine issues arising when considering anti-oppressive practices and healthcare research practices from the perspective of the authors’ experience of music therapy research

Evidence-Based Information Systems: A New Perspective and a Road Map for Research-Informed Practice

Despite the increasing sophistication and quality of published work, the development of a cumulative body of knowledge and an evidence-base for information systems (IS) research still represents a major challenge. IS research is still predominantly undertaken by IS researchers for other IS researchers and not utilized to its full extent by IS practitioners or policy-makers. We focus on this problem and express the need for a new evidence-based research perspective. It is argued that it is time to refocus the efforts of IS academics (and practitioners) to develop a new evidence-base for IS research whereby it can more routinely inform, develop, improve and support IS practice. We contribute to this debate by defining evidence-based practice (EBP), its relevance to IS, and the need to develop an evidence-based approach. We look in particular at its brief history, and its subsequent evolution, development and widespread acceptance in Medicine; making reference to recent arguments and critiques of EBP in other disciplines such as software engineering and management. We espouse the need to develop a similar evidence-based movement and infrastructure within the IS research and practitioner communities and then put forward a possible road map for the development of Evidence-Based Information Systems (EBIS) that comprises 9 key initiatives. We conclude our argument by stating that the current extent, severity and impact of IS failures are unacceptable, emphasizing the need for a new perspective for IS research that encourages and incorporates EBP as a guiding principle to inform better IS practice