Correcting Common Grammar Problems

Abstract

This experienced editor has developed a list of frequent grammatical mistakes in nursing manuscripts. She provides a reference guide for editing manuscripts in this article. Editing your manuscript before you submit it for publication is an essential step in the authoring process. In addition to verifying facts and tightening your writing, the revision should include attention to spelling, grammar, punctuation, and word usage. Errors in these basics of the writer's craft can lead an editor to suspect errors in the substance of your work. The most common errors I've encountered in nurses' writing involve the failure to match the plural and singular forms of nouns and verbs in an effort to deal with gender problems, as well as the inappropriate use of the plural pronoun “their” for the same reason. Authors tend to have the same style problems in all their writing, for example, using too few or too many commas. Revision should focus on your specific weaknesses while also including a check on other common errors. Table 1 includes common errors in word choice, punctuation, and usage that seem to plague nurses' written work along with examples and suggestions for revisions. Although there are many rules of English usage, these are the ones which tend to give nurses the most difficulty. Assure, Ensure, Insure Comprise, Consists Denote, Connote Effect, Affect e.g. vs. i.e. Imply, Infer Led, Lead Loose, Lose Nauseated, Nauseous Regime, Regimen Since, Because Too, To Which, That Apostrophe (') Colons (:) Commas (,) Hyphens (-) Parentheses () Quotation Marks (“ ”) Semicolons (;) Abbreviations Capitalization Plurals/Singulars This list of editing tips was developed based on my work with nurse authors as an Associate Editor of American Journal of Nursing, an editorial board member of Journal of Nursing Education and Journal of Continuing Education in Nursing, and as a sponsor of doctoral dissertations at Teachers College, Columbia University and thesis advisor at Western Connecticut State University. Nurse authors can use the suggestions to edit their manuscripts before submission, while nurse editors can use these guidelines to edit final manuscripts. Nurse managers, educators, and clinical nurse specialists can also use the suggestions to edit project proposals and reports as well. After you notice the common mistakes in nursing manuscripts, it becomes easy to pick out the problems. Try editing the following paragraph using the tips from Table 1 (There is extra space between the lines so you can edit the paragraph right here). Develop a nurse participation system for unit decisions. Some decisions that can be made by staff are ones requiring only unit changes while those requiring multidisciplinary involvement must be made by a hospital wide committee. Nurses need to be involved in making the decision on matters which effect them. The nurse's decisions are usually the correct ones for their unit. Now, compare your editing with the one below. In the section below deleted words are crossed out and added ones are in bold. Develop a nurse-participation system for unit decisions. Some decisions that can be made by staff are ones requiring only unit changes, while those requiring multidisciplinary involvement must be made by a hospital-wide committee. Nurses need to be involved in making the decisions on matters that affect them. The nurses' decisions are usually the correct ones for their unit. Editing helps to correct grammar and clarify your ideas so that your main points are communicated quickly to the reader.—Andrea B. O'Connor Ed.D, RN, Director and Professor, Department of Nursing, Western Connecticut State University in Danbury, Connecticut.