The
purpose of this assignment is to increase your knowledge of the current state of evidence on the health problem you will be addressing in your systematic review and to gain a better understanding of its importance. In addition, this assignment will help you effectively relay this information to others. It is important that you relay this information in writing that is academic, professional, concise, and evidence-based. Avoid including anecdotal evidence and/or describing your own experience with this health problem. The focus of this assignment is the health problem, NOT the specific interventions you intend to review in your systematic review.
The
task for this assignment is to write a first draft of the background section of your systematic review
(at least 2-3 paragraphs). In this assignment, you are setting the stage for why this health problem matters and why we should care and intervene.
It is often helpful to start broad and then become more specific. The following is an
example and may not apply to your health problem. The first paragraph may focus on the health problem (e.g., diabetes), providing context for those who might not be aware of the issue (e.g., prevalence, whether the prevalence has changed over time, the physical, emotional, financial consequences of the health problem, possibly the risk factors of the health problem if relevant to your topic, populations that are most affected, etc.). The second paragraph may start to narrow down to a specific behavior that may improve the health problem (e.g., diabetes self-management). So, in this example, then, the third paragraph may narrow down even further to the challenges of self-management of diabetes, such as lack of education or resources, time, need for reminders, and so on. This background will then support why, for this example, the objective of the review is to identify the most effective strategies to improve diabetes self-management.
This assignment must be written as you would write an academic journal article (i.e., organized paragraphs that include topic sentences followed by sentences that support those topic sentences). You must provide citations for the evidence that you discuss in your background. Do not use an abbreviation without defining it the first time you use it. You must write in complete sentences, use proper grammar, and avoid spelling mistakes. For the background, it is also recommended that you avoid using first-person. You must include a reference section for all articles cited in the background.
Do not assume that your readers are nurses or well versed in your specific topic. I expect you to convey the significance of your topic to someone who is not an expert in your field. You will need to do this in your future work environment as well. Further, you will need to be able to do this when speaking to key stakeholders and when you want to obtain funding and change policies and practice.
For this assignment, choose a health problem that is related to what you think the overarching focus of your scholarly project will be, e.g., diabetes. If it is not clear what your project will focus on, that is ok; reach out to me. The overall goal of this course is just to learn how to become an expert in a particular health problem and learn to find evidence for interventions that have been utilized to address that health problem. At this point, you are not expected to know the actual intervention that you will be implementing for your scholarly project. [NOTE: If you do know the intervention that you will be implementing, please come see me so that together we can decide whether you should find evidence to support that one intervention or if you should find evidence of several effective interventions, including the one you plan to implement. Oftentimes, there is not enough evidence on just one intervention and knowing the universe of interventions will help you become an expert on how your health problem is addressed in practice, even if you ultimately implement one type of intervention for your scholarly project.]
View Rubric
Background (1) |
|||||
Background (1) |
|||||
Criteria |
Pts |
||||
The background thoroughly, yet concisely, summarizes the health problem. The background sufficiently justifies why this issue matters and why we should care and intervene, i.e., the significance of addressing this issue. The background is organized effectively (paragraphs are in a logical order) with logical connections between paragraphs. The background is well-written and free from grammatical and spelling errors. Evidence is properly cited in the text and a reference list is provided. The uploaded file is saved as a word file and named as follows: LastnameFirstname_N900_Background-FirstDraft. |
/ 20 pts |