Dissemination Strategies
The practicum project under consideration is dedicated to the evaluation of actual needs and current knowledge of the target audience. The obtained data will be used for the assessment of educational programs design. It is important to select suitable dissemination strategies to provide the relevant research data. The choice of these strategies is conditioned by the target audience, main stakeholders, and the conditions of the research.
Target Audience
The target audience are the patients receiving high dose Ara-C. The assessment of their needs is necessary to address them and deliver suitable care. Cytarabine is a chemotherapeutic medicine with substantial neurological toxicity (Magge & DeAngelis, 2015. It has some side-effects which negatively influence the general condition of patients. Thus, the assessment of their needs will help to educate them to overcome these conditions.
Relevant Stakeholders
The relevant stakeholders in this project are the bedside nurses. They are close to patients and observe the change in their condition. Consequently, they can provide relevant information on the patients.
Needed Resources
The implementation of the project needs both human and material resources. Human resources include a researcher and the bedside nurses. The material resources include the forms to be completed. Thus, there will be an evaluation form to complete after verbal presentation, chart audit of neurological assessment of patients receiving high dose Cytarabine, and nurses’ survey on the use of handwriting tool to assess neurotoxicity.
Strategies
Various dissemination strategies can be applied to projects. In the case of the practicum project the following strategies should be considered. The choice of dissemination strategies or models should be regulated by certain criteria. First of all, the strategy should be designed for application by researchers because models for clinicians may be too complicated (Tabak, Khoog, Chambers, & Brownson, 2013). Secondly, the level of strategy application should be considered (Tabak et al., 2013).
Strategies Useful to the Dissemination of This Project
Motivation of participants: recipients should be motivated to provide relevant and objective data.
Care delivery setting (McCormack et al., 2013). It is important to consider the setting of the experiment particularly when the research deals with healthcare.
Type of media, mode, or channel (e.g., intervention format and delivery agent) (McCormack et al., 2013). Some people demonstrate better perception of printed materials while others need oral explanation.
Unit-level strategy Since the research is conducted within a clinical unit, a corresponding strategy will be useful (Tabak et al., 2013).
Strategy of simplicity (Cook, Cook, & Landrum, 2013). The survey materials should not be too complicated. It is advisable to make them comprehensible for every respondent.
Consultation strategy (Edmunds, Beidas, & Kendall, 2013). Consultations before the survey can be necessary to provide the quality of the data.
Strategies Not Appropriate for This Project’s Dissemination
National-level strategy (Tabak et al., 2013). This strategy is not applicable since the research is conducted in the conditions of a clinical unit.
Self-regulated strategy (Cook, Cook, & Landrum, 2013). This strategy is not appropriate for the research because respondents evaluate the behavior of the patients.
Conclusions
On the whole, researches prove the efficiency of dissemination strategies in reaching the target audience (Scullion, 2015). Their choice depends on the conditions and the final purpose of the research. Another aspect to consider is specific character of the target audience and relevant stakeholders to guarantee their participation and the honesty of responces.
References
Cook, B.G., Cook, L., & Landrum, T.J. (2013). Moving research into practice: Can we make dissemination stick? Council for Exceptional Children, 79(2), 163-180.
Edmunds, J.M., Beidas, R.S., & Kendall, P.C. (2013). Dissemination and implementation of evidence-based practices: Training and consulting as implementation strategies. Clinical Psychology, 20(2), 152-165. Web.
Magge, R. & DeAngelis, L. (2015). The double-edged sword: Neurotoxicity of chemotherapy. Blood Reviews, 29(2), 93-100. Web.
McCormack, L., Sheridan, S., Lewis, M., Boudewyns, V., Melvin, C.L., Kistler, C., … Lohr, K.N. (2013). Communication and dissemination strategies to facilitate the use of health-related evidence. Web.
Scullion, P. (2015). Effective dissemination strategies. Nurse researcher, 10(1), 65-77. Web.
Tabak, R.G., Khoog, E.C., Chambers, D., & Brownson, R. (2013). Bridging research and practice: Models for dissemination and implementation research. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 43(3), 337-350. Web.