Assignment about Effectiveness of an Intravenous

1
Effectiveness of an Intravenous Therapy in the Relief of Acute Asthma Symptoms for
Children Presenting in Ed
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

Effectiveness of an Intravenous Therapy in the Relief of Acute Asthma Symptoms for
Children Presenting in Ed
Asthma is a respiratory disorder that is characterised by the airflow limitation in the lungs
caused by narrowing of airways. Severe episodes of acute asthma in children pose a potentially life-
threatening situation and are required to be presented to the emergency department (ED). These
children with acute asthma exacerbations are required immediate interventions to reduce the signs of
respiratory distress and help them get relief from the symptoms of acute asthma. The management of
such patients requires a comprehensive situation assessment by the paediatric healthcare
professionals and treatment considerations, to decrease chronic morbidity and prevent further
exacerbation. The paper aims to develop a search strategy to conduct a literature review on the
effectiveness of intravenous therapy in the relief of acute asthma symptoms for children presenting to
the ED.
Background
Even though acute exacerbations in asthma is standard, preventive measures are required to
limit and reduce the symptoms present, especially for the children admitted in the emergency
department. The current treatment approach recommended and undertaken by paediatricians are the
administration of a Short-Acting Beta Agonists via inhaling. Even though such administration
procedure is rapidly effective, it may not provide adequate bronchodilation required for the
restoration of appropriate lung function. Magnesium is an effective bronchodilator and common in
emergency department hospitalisations. However, the method of administration of magnesium can
be either inhaled or intravenous. The effectiveness of inhaled magnesium is required to be compared
with the effectiveness of magnesium administered intravenously to determine the adequate procedure
of administration of the drugs to reduce the symptoms of acute asthma in children admitted to the
emergency department.
Research Question
What is the effectiveness of intravenous therapy in the relief of acute asthma symptoms for
children presenting in the emergency department?

Research Objectives
 To determine the effectiveness of magnesium administered intravenously in
comparison to inhaled magnesium in children admitted to the emergency department.
Methodology
To achieve this research objective, a systematic review of literature will be conducted on the
research question following extensive search strategies and protocols.
Search Strategy
To search literature relevant to the research question, three major medical databases will be
searched, including BioMed Central, PubMed Central and CINAHL. The primary goal of this
literature review is to gather highly reliable information on the research question to fulfil the
objective, and specific inclusion and exclusion criteria will determine whether the articles found in
the search results are adequate to be included in this study. The aforementioned medical databases
will be searched with the help of keywords, which includes children, emergency department,
intravenous therapy, intravenous magnesium, effectiveness, efficacy, acute asthma symptoms,
reduction, relief and pediatric patients. The use of Boolean operators will be ensured with the help of
the advanced search option available in the respective databases to be included between the
keywords for better search results. The Boolean operator ‘OR’ will be used to increase the count of
articles appearing in the search results and the Boolean operator ‘AND’ will be used to increase the
relevancy of the articles to the current research question,
Inclusion Criteria
A set of criteria will be used to filter the articles from the search results to be included in the
study. The primary inclusion criteria would be the selection of only peer-reviewed articles for further
evaluation and synthesis of information. Only the articles published between the years 2010 to 2019
will be made available for further selection. The language of publication should be English only. No
geographical limitation to the research articles will be done to increase the generalisability of the
results, ensuring it supports global compatibility. The articles fulfilling the above-said criteria will be
then reviewed and selected based on the level of evidence