Evidence-based practice in nursing begins with the identification of a clinical problem or issue that requires review, definition, judgment on interventions, or application of evidence. Your project is to identify that clinical problem or issue using the PICO format. The problem or issue must be able to be referenced with a minimum of four research articles. These four articles will be utilized in the upcoming Literature Review project.

This project has four parts which you are required to complete. Your paper should be 2-4 pages in length (a maximum of 4 pages excluding title page and references), typed and double-spaced using APA format.

Utilize the APA Style CENTRAL Writing Center. Choose Write a New Paper and choose the Basic Paper template. (A course document with directions will be provided at a later date.)

Title Page
A title page using correct APA format (including header and running head) should be the first page of this assignment.

Part 1: Introduction
The first part of the paper is the Introduction section. In this section, you should identify and explain the nature of the problem and provide information on the background of the problem and its significance to nursing. Also included should be information on the scope of the problem citing prevalence and incidence statistics.

Part 2: PICO Components
Use PICO format to identify your clinical problem or issue. This question will guide the written literature review you will be doing. Provide a discussion of each of the PICO points with rationale.

P= Patient population of interest: The patient population needs to be very specific in regards to demographics (age, gender, ethnicity), diagnoses (certain disorders), and perceived needs.
I= Intervention of interest: The intervention also needs to be narrow and based on treatment option, diagnosis, and patient perception of events. Examples of intervention or range of interventions of interest are exposure to diseases, prognostic factor A, or risk behavior. Think of this as the independent variable.
C= Comparison Group: The comparison group or the intervention group is similar to a control. An intervention can be the current standard of care or a new nursing care issue proposed in the nursing literature. You might want to compare against no disease, placebo or no intervention/therapy, or absence of risk factor.
O=Outcome of interest: The outcomes are the final data or assessment of the population in the comparison group. Think of this as the dependent variable. Examples of outcomes of interest are risk of disease, accuracy of diagnosis, rate or occurrence of adverse outcomes.

Part 3: PICO Question
This section contains your clinical issue or question stated in one sentence using the correct question template for asking PICO questions. Please refer to the attached sample question templates from the Melnyk and Fineout-Overholt text (see reference below).

Reference List
This section should include any references used to complete the PICO assignment. Remember to use correct APA format for the reference page as well as reference citations within the text of the paper.

Individual Contribution
Each student working with a peer(s) will complete a peer evaluation for each member of the project team. This information will be utilized in determining the final “individual contribution” score at the end of the course.

References you might find useful in this project are:

Melnyk, B.& Fineout-Overholt, E. (2005). Evidence-based practice in nursing & healthcare: A guide to best practice. Philadelphia: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. Chapters 1 and 2. (On reserve in the library)

Stone, P. W. (2002). Popping the PICO question in research and evidence-based practice. Applied Nursing Research, 16(2), 197-198.

Evaluation of the Project
The PICO Question Assignment comprises 10% of the total course grade. The project will be evaluated based on the following criteria:

Criteria Available
Points
Part 1: Introduction and Title Page 15
Part 2: The PICO Question Components 10
Part 3: PICO Question Using Template 10
APA Format, Spelling, Grammar, and Sentence Structure 10
Reference Page 5
Total 50