RAMESES: Meta-narrative reviews & realist syntheses

The Journal of Advanced Nursing has published two standards developed as part of the Realist and Meta-narrative Evidence Syntheses Evolving Standards (RAMESES) project: “The RAMESES project is a NIHR funded international collaboration to produce such guidance and standards for these new forms of systematic review – Realist syntheses and Meta-narrative reviews.”

“RAMESES publication standards: meta-narrative reviews” can be found here:
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jan.12092/full

“RAMESES publication standards: realist syntheses” can be found here:
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jan.12095/full

 

Getting the Most Out of Citation Databases

Jackie McGrath, Roy Brown and Haifa Samra’s new article, ”Before You Search the Literature: How to Prepare and Get the Most Out of Citation Databases,” will be especially helpful to emerging researchers and doctoral students (as well as clinicians):

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1527336912000748

Abstract: As evidence-based practice becomes more integrated into routine care, systematically searching of the literature is essential to making informed clinical decisions. To uncover all the evidence and get the most unbiased sense of what is known about a particular phenomenon or caregiving practice, a clear method of searching that is systematic is needed. This article provides a discussion of six steps in a systematic search: (1) constructing the question, (2) choose the appropriate database(s), (3) formulate a search strategy, (4) perform the search, (5) evaluate the results, (6) good results (answer the question) = use the search information, (7) bad results = start over (refine the search strategies). Tips for working with a librarian are also provided. Lastly, a checklist developed to facilitate the steps of the searching process is discussed and provided for use by readers. Nurses are not trained to systematically search the literature, yet evidence-based practice demands that nurses and all health professionals be familiar with the searching process, especially when making evidence-based caregiving decisions.

IRBs and the Making of Ethical Research

Today Inside Higher Ed interviews researcher Laura Stark, author of a new book published by University of Chicago Press, Behind Closed Doors: IRBs and the Making of Ethical Research.

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/02/08/author-provides-inside-look-irbs

The interview includes practical advice for successful IRB application.

Chronicle: Citation by Citation, New Maps Chart Hot Research and Scholarship’s Hidden Terrain

Jennifer Howard’s article “Citation by Citation, New Maps Chart Hot Research and Scholarship’s Hidden Terrain” in the 11 September 2011 Chronicle of Higher Education discusses recent research and application development by a team led by two biologists, Carl T. Bergstrom and Jevin D. West, and a physicist, Martin Rosvall to map connections among research articles in different disciplines.

Their bibliometric analysis and the tool they are developing may help researchers to discover research outside their fields in journals that they would not normally read.

The article is on line for subscribers to the Chronicle, but a paper by Rosvall and Bergstrom, “Mapping Change in Large Networks,” is available in open access on line.

Call for Comments: Proposed Changes to Common Rule (Human Participants)

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services invites public comments on proposed changes to the Common Rule: Human Subject Research Protections: Enhancing Protections for Research Subjects and Reducing Burden, Delay, and Ambiguity for Investigators.

For more information, visit:
http://www.hhs.gov/ohrp/humansubjects/anprm2011page.html

Inside Higher Ed: Updating the Common Rule

Reported in “Updating the Common Rule” in today’s Inside Higher Ed:

Scientists and scholars have had no shortage of complaints about the impact that federal rules governing human research subjects have on their work. The elaborate review process involving institutional boards and federal panels has failed to keep pace with the explosion in federally supported research projects — with the system spread so thin focusing on studies that pose little to no risk, critics argue, that it sometimes fails to pay sufficient attention to those that could significantly imperil participants.

The federal government’s first major review of its so-called Common Rule governing the protection of human research subjects, announced last month, has the potential to ease if not resolve many of the concerns of scholars, based on the early signs, say several experts on research policies, including several traditionally vocal critics.

New Link: Directory of Open Access Journals

A new link added to our “Blinks” list, Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), maintained by the Swedish Lund University Libraries. As the home page notes:

This service covers free, full text, quality controlled scientific and scholarly journals. We aim to cover all subjects and languages. There are now 4434 journals in the directory. Currently 1697 journals are searchable at article level. As of today 326846 articles are included in the DOAJ service.

Journals are categorized by subject, including 28 nursing journals (as well as journals of medicine, dentistry, and public health). Journals outside North America appear to be generously represented.

Inside Higher Ed: Correcting APA Style Guide

In an article “Correcting a Style Guide” in today’s Inside Higher Ed, reporter Jennifer Epstein writes:

Scholars turn to style manuals for guidance in authoring error-free manuscripts, but what happens when the manual itself is laden with errors?

Users of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association are trying to answer that question now, after the APA last week released dozens of corrections to the first printing of the book’s sixth edition. In addition to being used in psychology, the manual is also used in sociology, economics, business, nursing and justice administration, among other fields.

Readers can find four pages of corrections in PDF format, in addition to four corrected sample papers.

RWJF Slide Finder

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation offers a slide finder for presenters who want to use information gained through RWJF research outcomes in their own presentations. There are a total of 224 slides available for use.
http://www.rwjf.org/pr/product.jsp?id=44750

NYU Literature, Arts, Medicine Database

Added today to the NursingWriting “blinks” list is the Literature, Arts & Medicine Database initiated in 1993 by medical humanities faculty at NYU.

This index of literary texts, visual art, and media/performance touches on a broad range of representations of the body, wellness, illness, disease, and the healing professions. New additions and annotations are always welcome.

The searchable database allows you to look for individual authors or artists or for themes. For example, a search of the word “nurse” delivers 282 results. Pre-established keywords are also provided. For example, selecting the provided keyword “nursing” brings the reader to an inventory of four visual artists, 21 films, and dozens of literary texts.

Users still have to find the actual art, literature or media themselves, though in many instances these can be found on line (after some diligent searching).

Nurse educators will find this index useful in helping students explore the complex human dimensions of clinical encounters. Nurse writers will find this index helpful by leading them to sources of reflection and to cultural touchstones.