INDIVIDUAL TOPIC SEARCH STRATEGY (ITSS) GUIDELINES

PURPOSE

· The purpose of this initial paper is to briefly describe your search strategies when identifying an articles that pertain to an evidence-based practice topic of interest.

REQUIREMENTS/PREPARING THE PAPER

· Each student will sign-up for a group to formulate an evidence-based practice topic of interest

(My topic is Interventions to promote social interactions in children with autistic disorder spectrum)

· Each group will formulate research question using PICO format.

P: Children with autistic disorder 

I: Play therapy

C: no therapy, no intervention

O: increase social behaviors

· Each group member will search, retrieve, and receive approval for 1 PRIMARY DATA ARTICLE to answer the group Research Question.

(I will attached the article for you to use my professor already approved it)

· Paper should include a Title and Reference pages.

· Page Length: 3-4 pages Excluding Title and Reference pages

· PAPER FORMAT

Clinical Question

Research Question- Describe problem

· Accurately and clearly states your research question using PICO format

· P: Children with autistic disorder

· I: Play therapy

· C: no therapy, no intervention

· O: increase social behaviors

Overview of the Problem- Overview/Significance of problem in terms of outcomes or statistics

· What statistics document this is a problem? (facts and figures)

Significance of the Problem-

· What statistic document this is a problem?

· What health outcomes result from this problem. Why should people be concerned about this problem?

Purpose of Paper:

The purpose of this paper is to describe search strategies to find evidence in supporting our groups PICO question.

Search Strategy

Search Terms

· List all terms used to search for your article (i.e. breast cancer, screening, mammography, intervention, assessment, influencing factors….etc.)

(I used autism, social behavior, and therapy)

Library Databases

· List Chamberlain library database used (i.e. EBSCO, Medline, OVID, PubMed….etc.)

· Google search engine is NOT the library database

(I used EBSCO)

Availability of Articles

· How many research articles were available to answer your research question?

· Provide numbers of articles, NOT just saying “plenty, sufficient, many…etc.

Refinement Decisions

· What decision(s) have changed from your original search strategies? (i.e. peer-review, within last 5 years, primary data article, full-text….etc.)

· As you did your search, what decisions did you make in refinement to get your required articles down to a reasonable number for review?

· What was your rationale for your decision to change from original search strategies?

Final Article

· Describe decisions you made to specifically select 1 PRIMARY DATA ARTICLE as relevant for answering your Research Question

Level of Evidence

Addresses Topic/Relevance to PICO

· Describe how article addresses the topic, purpose and key points

Evidence Level Pyramid

· Identify and describe the level of evidence based on Evidence Level/Hierarchy Pyramid

· Refers to Handout (Quick Guide to Designs in an Evidence Hierarchy)

Study Type

· Identify study type of article: Quantitative, Qualitative, or Mixed-Method Study

Format

§ Use of headings for each section

§ Use of APA format (7th edition)