Critical Analysis of Smeulers et al. (2014) Article on Nurses' Experiences and Perspectives on Medication Safety Practices

Running head: CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF ARTICLE 1
Critical Analysis of Article
Student’s Name
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CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF ARTICLE 2
Critical Analysis of Article
Introduction
This essay is an analysis of the work of Smeulers, Onderwater, Zwieten & Vermeulen
(2014) article “the nurses' experiences and perspectives on medication safety practices: an
explorative qualitative study”. Smeulers, Onderwater, Zwieten & Vermeulen (2014) focused on
the importance of reducing medical errors through increased safety in clinical settings. The aim
of the study was to asses the experiences of nurses in reducing medical errors through assessing
their experiences and strategies used to increase patient safety. Bhakar & Nathani (2015) suggest
that a good introduction should give an overview of the whole document by providing
background information on the research topic. This should be from a general or broader
perspective and later narrow down to the specific issues within the main focus of the study. The
introduction of the article meets the quality of empirical research since it highlights the issue of
errors from a medical perspective and the view of nurses and later narrows down to the real issue
of discussion which is the experiences of nurses in reducing medical errors.
From the study, the reader is led by the introduction since it focuses on the wider and
specific scope of the study. Through the introduction, Bhakar & Nathani (2015) suggest that the
researcher sets the reader in a broader context and narrows down to the research problem which
leads to research hypothesis by opening the mind of the reader to many questions about the
problem. The article properly puts the research topic of medical errors in context by explaining
why the study was done and through the statement of purpose, the reader is introduced to the
issue of medical errors and the need to reduce them as a way of increasing quality outcomes
within hospital settings.
The research problem and its significance

CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF ARTICLE 3
Smeulers, Onderwater, Zwieten & Vermeulen (2014), present their research problem as
exploration of the perspectives and experiences of nurses in an attempt to prevent medical
administration errors. Smeulers, Onderwater, Zwieten & Vermeulen (2014) do not present their
research problem as a single part of the article but rather explain the research problem in the
introduction which gives the background of the study. The reader could easily highlight the
research problem when reading through the article at the end of the introduction. This research
problem is stated in a single line at the top of the article to allow the researcher to trace down the
main content of the research in the background information. According to Kush (2015) a good
problem statement should allow the reader determine the magnitude of the research, the rate of
change expected in the research, the people affected, and the system response to the problem. All
these characteristics could be seen in the research problem “to explore nurses’ experiences with
and perspectives on preventing medication administration errors”. This problem is stated clearly
and succinctly allowing the reader to connect its content with the introduction and conclusion of
the study.
From the above statement, the reader could generate research questions at the back of the
mind since the problem is clear. Further, it allows the researcher to place the topic in a particular
context. This allows the means to answer the “so what” question which makes the research study
to meet the relevancy test by yielding the same results when repeated again. Therefore, a good
research problem should meet the grand challenge characteristics by showing its relevance to the
field of study (Annamalai, Kamaruddin, Azid, & Yeoh, 2013). The research problem meets the
grand challenge requirement since it has relevance to the field of nursing and improvement of
patient outcomes.
The research design and the methods