Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) Final Projects
The Doctor of Nursing Practice Final Projects collection contains the completed works of students from the DNP Program at Arizona State University's College of Nursing and Health Innovation. These projects are the culminating product of the curricula and demonstrate clinical scholarship.
Filtering by
- All Subjects: Guidelines
- All Subjects: Suicide
The utilization of suicide risk assessment tools is a critical component of a comprehensive approach to suicide risk assessment. However, some professionals hesitate to utilize screening tools routinely in practice. A project was undertaken to determine if the utilization of the Columbia-Suicide Severity Scale (C-SSRS) improved staff confidence in assessing suicide risk. Professionals within a psychiatric urgent care in Scottsdale, Arizona were provided with
training on the C-SSRS. Participants then utilized the C-SSRS at triage with patients presenting with depression and/or suicidality over a two-month period.
Self confidence in assessing suicide risk was evaluated utilizing The Efficacy in Assessing and Managing Suicide Risk Scale (SETSP-S). The acceptability and usability of the C-SSRS was evaluated utilizing The System Usability Scale (SUS). Findings of the Wilcoxon Signed Ranks test indicated changes in pre and posttest assessment scores as significant in seven of the eight assessment parameters. In addition, Cohen's effect size value suggested medium or large clinical significance in these same assessment parameters.
Evidence suggests that efficient and effective assessment can improve staff confidence in assessing for suicidality and may improve morbidity and mortality rates for patients. The utilization of tools such as the C*SSRS could reduce health care costs associated with unnecessary hospital admissions as well as rehospitalizations. The routine utilization of assessment tools such as the C-SSRS many also be beneficial to healthcare specialties outside of behavioral health such as emergency departments and urgent care settings.
Methods: A multifaceted intervention was utilized that included educational sessions for providers, adjustments to the electronic health record (EHR), access to toolkits, and workflow changes. Pediatric patients aged 5-18 years and diagnosed with asthma (N = 173) were evaluated using a pre-post design. Provider adherence to key components of clinical practice guidelines were assessed prior to implementation, and a three and six months post-implementation. Data was analyzed using descriptive statists and the Friedman’s ANOVA by rank.
Results: Provider education, EHR adjustments, provider toolkits, and changes to office workflow improved provider adherence to key aspects of asthma clinical practice guidelines. A significant difference was found between the pre and post implementation groups (p < .01).
Conclusion: Increased adherence to clinical practice guidelines leads to fewer complications and an overall improved quality of life. Continuing provider education is critical to sustained adherence.
Suicide among first responders, including pre-hospital emergency providers, emergency department staff, and law enforcement, is significantly higher than among the general population. There are various forms of mental health interventions, however, knowledge held by first responders could be a predictor of mental health outcomes. Implementing an educational curriculum enhancement for emergency medical technician (EMT) students may help increase self-efficacy and knowledge of mental health.
In a community college in the southwestern United States, an educational intervention was developed to enhance mental health knowledge for EMT students. The intervention was created to include four interactions with students in the classroom setting to implement recruitment, pre and post survey completion, and a 1-hour lecture. The surveys consisted of pre and post student assessment of mental health knowledge and self-efficacy. Results suggested that EMT students increased their knowledge of mental health and personal self-efficacy. This intervention is brief and effortlessly implemented into an existing curriculum to produce strong outcomes.
This project demonstrates that a brief educational intervention offers an effective means of knowledge improvement while being cost effective and easily implemented. The use of curriculum enhancement was a novel approach and filled an identified gap in literature and education. Additional research is needed to further explore the effects of mental health knowledge enhancement for first responders.
requiring readmission the same day as discharge.
Method: The purpose of project was to check the feasibility of the use of cognitive behavioral therapy-based group called Creating Opportunities for Personal Empowerment (COPE) in the treatment of children with depression and suicidality. The study patients participated in up to 7 groups of a 60-minute lesson of COPE each day, combined with interactive activities that helped
them practice problem solving and coping skills. The feasibility of the COPE groups were measured by the consistent decrease of Columbia Suicide Severity Rating Scale at the beginning and conclusion of lessons as well as consistency of engaged participation in the COPE groups on the unit based of staff observation obtained from Staff Survey.
Results: The results analyzed using the two-tailed Wilcoxon signed rank test were significant based on an alpha value of 0.05, V = 0.00, z = -3.64, p < .001. This indicated that the differences between Pre-CSSR and Post-CSSR were not likely due to random post variation. The median of Pre-CSSR (Mdn = 1.00) was significantly lower than the median of Post-CSSR (Mdn = 2.00).
Discussion: The results proved feasibility of a cognitive behavioral therapy-based group in the treatment of depression and suicidality of children in an inpatient unit.
Background and Significance: HF affects over 5.1 million people in the United States, costing $31 billion a year; $1.7 billion spent on Medicare readmissions within 30 days of discharge. Guidelines and care coordination prevent expenses related to hospital readmissions and improve quality of life for adults with HF.
Methods: Healthcare providers (HCPs) at a metropolitan hospital participated in an education session reviewing HF treatment and CMD. Thirty participants completed the single five-point Likert scale pre/post surveys evaluating their opinions of knowledge and behaviors toward implementation of guidelines and CMD. Patient outcome data was abstracted measuring pre/post education compliance for ejection fraction, ACE/ARB, beta-blocker, HF education, follow-up appointments, aldosterone antagonist, anticoagulation, hydralazine nitrate, and CMD 30-45 day’s pre/post education. Analyses included descriptive statistics of participants and pre/post surveys using a paired t-test. Percentage of compliance for quality measures was completed on patients from September through December.
Results: Providers post intervention showed improved knowledge and behaviors toward implementation of guidelines and CMD, including reconciliation of medications to statistical significance. However, the demographics showed the majority of participants were non-cardiac specialties. Improved compliance for outcome data of quality measures was insignificant over time. The non-cardiac demographic may have contributed to this result.
Conclusion: The surveys did not correlate with the patient outcome data. Recommendations would include targeting cardiac focused HCPs for future education sessions.
Background:
Asthma is one of the most common pediatric diseases, affecting 6.3 million U.S. children in 2014, that can result in negative health outcomes if not managed correctly due to it's chronic and complex nature requiring frequent and close management (NHLBI, 2007). The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute's (NHLBI) Guidelines for the Diagnosis and Management of Asthma will be implemented into practice to determine the health outcomes of patients before and after guideline implementation.
Methods:
Inclusion criteria includes patients 5-18 years with a history of asthma, recurrent albuterol use, or intermittent symptoms of airflow obstruction. Data will be collected through EHR data reports at pre implementation, 3 months, and 6 months post implementation and will be analyzed using SPSS. Descriptive statistics, paired t-tests, and a Friedman's ANOVA will be conducted to analyze data.
Results:
A Friedman ANOVA was conducted comparing the outcome variables six months priot to the practice change, at three months post implementation, and at six months post implementation. A significant difference was found (x2(15) = 216.62, p<.05). The implementation of the practice change significantly affected the outcome variables.
Conclusions:
In general, the implementation of a practice change to use evidence based NHLBI ERP-3 Asthma Guidelines, along with staff and provider education sessions and creation of standardized assessment and documentation tools resulted in positive changes in the outcomes variables. Findings from this study along with the literature of implementing evidence based asthma guidelines supports similar practice change implementations in other pediatric primary care clinics.
Suicide has become a national concern due to the increasing rates across the country. The 2012 National Strategy for Suicide Prevention aims to improve the area of clinical prevention. Emergency departments (ED) play a key role in addressing this effort as they have multiple opportunities to connect with patients who are at risk. There exists a high-risk period of time immediately following a patient’s discharge from emergency care. To address this period of concern, a review of the literature was conducted on the effectiveness of follow-up contacts as a means to prevent suicide and suicide related attempts in this at-risk population.
Based on this review, a follow-up intervention was proposed to increase patients’ social support and knowledge on suicide prevention through a safety plan and the use of caring postcards. The aim was to evaluate the degree to which implementation of a safety plan and follow-up using postcards reduces suicide risk in the ED. ED suicide prevention practices such as safety planning and caring contacts with postcards have shown to be feasible and cost-effective methods to reduce patients’ risk of suicide as they provide education and address the high-risk period of time after discharge.
Using a quasi-experimental pre and post-test design, English speaking adults 18 years of age and older, admitted to an ED in the Phoenix Metropolitan area with suicidal ideation, were voluntarily recruited for two weeks. The self-rated Suicidal Behaviors Questionnaire-Revised (SBQ-R) was used as a baseline assessment along with the introduction of a safety plan. Participants were then followed with the receipt of postcards with caring messages over a two-week period, and a final SBQ-R. The SBQ-R has shown beneficial reliability and validity measuring suicidality in the adult population. Data from the pre-SBQ-R was analyzed using descriptive statistics as no post-SBQ-Rs were received. Outcomes for this project included a reduction in suicidal ideation and suicide risk.
This project provides insight into the implementation of a safety plan and follow-up intervention in the ED and their attempts to reduce acute suicide risk as well as highlight the value that post-ED support provides.
Keywords: suicide, prevention, safety plan, caring messages, postcards, emergency department, follow-up, contacts, brief intervention
Background:
Thirty to fifty percent of cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy will experience
chemotherapy induced nausea and or vomiting (CINV) despite the use of antiemetic prophylaxis Uncontrollable CINV can lead to complications that add extra stress to patients, increase in healthcare costs, and utilization of resources. CINV can lead to chemotherapy dose reductions, treatment delays, chemotherapy changes, or discontinuation of treatment. Guidelines exist to better prevent and treat CINV. Evidence supports the use of guidelines to prevent CINV, however patients still suffer from CINV often due to a lack of guideline adherence.
Objectives:
The purpose of this project was to increase CINV guideline adherence by increasing knowledge of antiemetic guidelines utilizing an educational intervention for providers and nurses at an outpatient oncology office.
Methods:
A brief educational intervention on CINV and recommended NCCN guidelines was
conducted with providers and nurse (n=6) at an oncology practice in Southwestern United States. An evaluation to assess change in knowledge was performed using a pre and post test format. Statistical analysis was performed using descriptive statistics, McNemar tests and Wicoxan Signed Rank Test.
Findings:
There was a significant effect on knowledge of NCCN antiemetic guidelines (Z=-1.89, p=0.059, mean 2.5) post intervention. There also was a significant impact on likelihood to use guidelines in practice (Z=-1.89, p=0.059, mean 2.5). Increasing awareness and likelihood to CHEMOTHERAPY INDUCED NAUSEA AND VOMITING 3 follow recommended guidelines may improve CINV symptoms in patients undergoing chemotherapy and improve the treatment outcomes for these patients.