Diabetes Evidence-Based Project: Disseminating Results Report (Assessment)

Evidence-based practices (EBP)

The promotion of lifestyle and dietary changes among newly diagnosed with type 2 diabetes African Americans is a core idea of this EBP project, and the dissemination of the research results plays a crucial role. The major goal of dissemination is to ensure positive changes in care, which includes:

1. The improvement of care quality by managing the health among minority populations (Hearld et al., 2019);
2. The promotion of evidence impact and explanation of significant terms and statistical data (Zhang et al., 2020);
3. The motivation of people, either patients or stakeholders who could make certain contributions to the healthcare system (Melnyk & Fineout-Overholt, 2018);
4. The exchange of information at different levels by means of cooperation.

Dissemination Strategies

There are many strategies that can be offered to disseminate the results of the EBP capstone project, and some of them are defined as effective (inclined to use) and ineffective (not inclined to use). In this presentation, the involvement of mentors and collaboration with administration and other stakeholders are the preferred steps, and the idea to use social networking and web pages has to be removed. EBP mentors are able to identify the most appropriate methods to share new information and motivate participants. They have to learn an organizational culture and the beliefs of the clinical staff to rely on the chosen values and abilities (Melnyk et al., 2016). Administration and stakeholders disseminate the results due to their abilities to place posters and other materials to educate the locals and share new achievements in the chosen research area. Collaboration means the creation of healthcare alliances to remove the gap between practice and evidence (Hearld et al., 2019). Social networking and webpages are less effective for dissemination because there are no guarantees that information is properly distributed and understood distantly.

Dissemination Strategy Rationale

The main rationale for the chosen dissemination strategy is the presence of a particular person to introduce and guide a change. The identification of the role of EBP mentors is a great opportunity to enhance communication between stakeholders, share information about the chosen health problem, and underline the worth of evidence in care (Melynk & Fineout-Overholt, 2018). In addition, a well-trained mentor serves as a source of motivation and explanation of current achievements and interventions to improve health and predict complications.

Dissemination Barriers

Despite the possibility of developing a strong EBP project, some barriers are hard to predict and overcome due to their unpredictability. In this project, attention has to be paid to organizational culture and its appropriateness for the offered change (Melnyk et al., 2016). If culture and the environment do not support the EBP idea, high-quality care can hardly be promoted, and stakeholders should interpret the results in a clear and understandable way. Melnyk et al. (2016) also identify such barriers as the lack of skills and the inability to see the main facts about the health problem. EBP competencies are developed upon the findings of the studies, and inadequate resources lead to poorly taken steps and a lack of success.

How to Overcome the Barriers

Many strategies are developed to overcome the barriers during the process of dissemination. The first task is to identify the barriers and study each of them; the next step is to investigate the existing models for overcoming the barriers and make a final choice, regarding available resources and the environment (Melnyk & Fineout-Overholt, 2018). As soon as the model is introduced, it is necessary to make sure that every single step is recognized and followed. The choice of a leader is the ability to motivate and guide other stakeholders, either passive or active. Finally, the analysis of the achievements cannot be ignored because it is a chance to observe what is done right and wrong and make the necessary adjustments.

Dissemination Outcomes

Some people do not find dissemination as an integral research process and focus on the development of new strategies and skills. However, there is a list of outcomes that cannot be ignored in the EBP project, and they include:

• Awareness of evidence – when people learn something new and realize that much scientific support exists at the moment;
• Health-related decisions – when patients and the medical staff understand that their shared decision-making and cooperation directly contributes to health;
• Positive changes – when stakeholders observe that evidence helps to change the quality of care and introduce new behavioral strategies;
• Prediction of problems – when evidence is analyzed and used to demonstrate how human actions reduce or increase the current statistics;
• Further discussion – when people are interested in the continuation of research and finding out new approaches to deal with a disease.

References

Hearld, L., Alexander, J.A., Wolf, L.J., & Shi, Y. (2019). Dissemination of quality improvement innovations by multisector health care alliances. Journal of Health Organization and Management, 33(4), 511-528. Web.

Melnyk, B. M. & Fineout-Overholt, E. (2018). Evidence-based practice in nursing & healthcare: A guide to best practice (4th ed.). Wolters Kluwer.

Melynk, B.M., Fineout-Overholt, E., Giggleman, M., & Choy, K. (2017). A test of the ARCC Model improved implementation of evidence-based practice, healthcare culture, and patient outcomes. Worldviews on Evidence-Based Nursing, 14(1), 5-9.

Zhang, Y., Pan, X. F., Chen, J., Xia, L., Cao, A., Zhang, Y., Wang, J., Li, H., Yang, K., Guo, K., He, M., & Pan, A. (2020). Combined lifestyle factors and risk of incident type 2 diabetes and prognosis among individuals with type 2 diabetes: A systematic review and meta-analysis of prospective cohort studies. Diabetologia, 63(1), 21-33. Web.