Comparison of the Quality of Pediatric Randomized Controlled Trials Published in Both Nursing and Medical Journals: Adherence to the CONSORT Statement.

BACKGROUND: Nursing care should be based on scientific evidence. However, studies must be performed rigorously with accurate reporting for their findings to be applicable to practice. Since the body of scientific nursing literature is broad, the quality and validity of its findings should be regularly controlled and verified to ensure their application and their practical impact. PURPOSE: To compare reporting quality of pediatric randomized controlled trial (RCT) articles in nursing and medical journals. METHODS: Randomly selected articles were reviewed and scored to assess the number of CONSORT items that were adequately reported, generating a CONSORT score. The CONSORT scores for 28 items were compared between the two journal types. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION: The CONSORT scores by journal type were not significantly different: (19.2 [16.2; 22] for medical journals and 19.5 [16.1; 21.5] for nursing journals, p = .77). The reporting of CONSORT items was poor for both journal types. However, there were two significant differences: item 19 (Declaration of all important harm or unintended effects, p = .0006) and item 23 (Registration number of the study, p = .0003), were reported more often in medical journals. The adherence of journals to the CONSORT statement and large sample size was associated with better quality of the reporting of studies. CONCLUSIONS: Based on reporting quality, nursing studies have the same scientific credibility and rigor as medical studies in the pediatric field. LINKING EVIDENCE TO ACTION: The findings of this study could help researchers improve the reporting of their studies and highlight the importance of reporting quality for future knowledge transfer and practical use. The quality of research and its reporting is necessary to improve knowledge transfer into practice.

Identification and comparison of France to other countries of the teaching of research to nursing students: Results of an international survey of nursing educator.

PURPOSE: Registered nurses must have a level of scientific literacy to be able to interpret research data and access Scientific's knowledge. Several studies have been conducted to explore barriers and levers to the dissemination of nurse's knowledge; however, the scientific literacy that nursing students acquire has not been studied. OBJECTIVE: The aim was to examine and compare the way that research is taught to undergraduate nursing students in France and other countries. DESIGN: Cross-sectional, Internet survey. SETTINGS: Universities providing undergraduate nursing programs around the world. PARTICIPANTS: Nurses educators. METHODS: Schools of nursing and universities were contacted by mail, through social networks and with the help of national or international nursing organizations. Respondents provided demographic data on schools and faculties of nursing, the teaching of scientific databases, Reading Critical Analysis and the teaching of scientific English. Information on the transmission of articles and access to scientific knowledge by students through the institution were also requested. FINDINGS: A total of 245 nursing schools/universities participated. Most respondents were educational research referees (52.2%), worked in a public institution (85.7%) and were in the nursing program leading to a bachelor's degree (74.3%). Databases were taught at 56.8%, Critical Reading of Articles at 70.1%, scientific English at 60.6% of nursing schools or universities. Articles were provided to students at 89.6% of institution and students had access to data through the institution in 66.1% of nursing schools or universities. Several significant differences were found between French schools of nursing and nursing schools/universities in other countries. CONCLUSIONS: Our results show that most schools or universities of nursing teach the three majors' components to promote, provide articles to students and give access to scientific knowledge. However, there is wide heterogeneity between countries. There is a need to standardize research education for nursing students worldwide to promote the development of scientific literacy skills.

Study characteristics impacted the pragmatism of randomized controlled trial published in nursing: a meta-epidemiological study.

OBJECTIVES: The objective of this study was to examine the impact of study characteristics on the score of the pragmatism/explanatory continuum of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) published in nursing journals using the PRagmatic Explanatory Continuum Indicator Summary (PRECIS)-2 tool. STUDY DESIGN AND SETTING: RCTs concerning five themes of nursing care indexed in the PubMed and CINAHL databases published from 2002 to 2005 and 2012 to 2015 were selected by title/abstract. A sample of 400 was randomly selected and evaluated with the PRECIS-2 tool and reading grid. RESULTS: The median PRECIS score was 32 of a possible 45 [28; 36] corresponding to a medium level of pragmatism. Studies with "medication" as an intervention had a more explanatory PRECIS score than studies with other intervention types (P = 0.015). Studies with "placebo" and "no usual care" as comparators had a more explanatory PRECIS score (P = 0.0027). The pragmatism/explanatory level was unaffected by impact factor (P = 0.42), h-index of the first and last author (P = 0.27 and P = 0.25, respectively), funding (P = 0.32), blinding (P = 0.41), sample size (P = 0.22), and time (P = 0.11). CONCLUSION: This study highlights the pragmatism/explanatory level of nursing RCTs, the impact of the field of the article, and the comparator type on the pragmatism of these studies. Further studies are needed to confirm the astonishing result that blinding resulted in no significant difference in the PRECIS score.