Nursing Staff Awareness about Evidence Based Practice: Facilitations, Barriers and Beliefs

Abstract

Background: Today evidence-based practice (EBP) becomes one of the best ways that used for making clinical decisions and has an effect on health care outcomes as well as it improves the quality of care provided to patients. Aim: Assess nursing staff awareness about evidence based practice facilitations, barriers and beliefs at Belqas Central Hospital (BCH). Design: Cross sectional design. Settings: current study was carried out at Belqas Central Hospital (BCH), affiliated to Ministry Of Health, Dakahlia Governorate. Subjects: the study was conducted on nursing staff (228). Data collection tools: Data was collected using evidence based practice (EBP) questionnaire, Facilitators to change practice based on evidence based practice scale, barriers to find, use and review evidence scale and evidence based practice beliefs scale. Results: revealed that the highest total mean score of facilitations was related to organizational structure and health care environment while the lowest mean score was related to research information. As well as the highest total mean score of barriers was related to individual nurse characteristics while the lowest mean score was related to research information. Also 69% of nursing staff were agreeing with EBP, realizing its benefits and importance. Conclusion: nursing staff focus on their experience and ways that always used in providing nursing care as a source for their information. In addition to most of them were competent in fifinding, reviewing and using evidence in practice. Organizational structure and health care environment was perceived as a main facilitation of EBP, while individual nurse characteristics were perceived as the highest barriers of EBP. Most nursing staff had positive beliefs about EBP and realized its benefits in health care system. Recommendations: Ongoing training programs about EBP for nursing staff, maintaining adequate staffing in different shift to relieve nurses’ workload and help them to attain workshops and scientific conferences that updating and increasing their knowledge about EBP. Provide organizational support for EBP implementation. Translating the most relevant researches and distributed them for nurses to apply in practice to overcome the English language barrier. Increasing interest in the research and EBP process through integrating the EBP strategies in nursing curriculum.