CNA672 Semester 5 Assignment: Critical Review of Research Paper

This report provides a critical review of a qualitative research article that investigates the perspectives of older patients and healthcare professionals on maintaining dignity in acute hospital care. The research, employing a qualitative methodology, utilizes semi-structured interviews with patients and healthcare staff to gather in-depth insights. The review assesses the appropriateness of the research design, recruitment strategy, and data collection methods, highlighting the use of purposive sampling and semi-structured interviews to gather relevant data. The analysis of the research emphasizes the rigor of data analysis, including thematic analysis, coding, and the use of triangulation to ensure trustworthiness. The findings of the study reveal key themes related to dignified care, with the research concluding that while improvements are noted, challenges remain in ensuring patient dignity, particularly due to inadequately trained staff. The report underscores the value of the research in identifying areas for improvement in healthcare practices and suggests the need for further studies to address the multifaceted aspects of patient dignity in acute care environments. The research also provides recommendations for systematic dignity-related training for healthcare professionals to reduce the cases of dignity breach and improve patient care.

Critical review of qualitative research

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3. Was the research design appropriate to address the aims of research?
Yes.
The research design comprises of a semi-structured interview conducted on the older patients
and the health professionals. This interview method is appropriate as it is essential to gain deeper
understanding about the perspectives of the patients and healthcare staffs regarding the
maintenance of dignity in the acute care environment (Brodtkorb, Skisland, Slettebø & Skaar,
2017). This interview process would help the researcher to extract needful information from the
target participants. With the help of semi-structured interview, the researcher was able to gain
sufficient information from the patients and the health officials regarding the dignity of the
patients during treatment. The research design navigated the research process towards the proper
path through which needful research data could be extracted by analysing the information given
by the participants in interview. The research design allowed smooth flow of information with
higher level of accuracy as the participants comprised of the service users and the service
providers.
4. Was the recruitment strategy appropriate to the aims of the research?
Yes.
To conduct the interview process, the researcher undertook a purposive sampling technique to
shortlist the research participants. Purposive sampling is conducted in accordance to the research
objectives (Robinson, 2014). As the objective indicates towards older people in acute care
environment, the researcher adopted purposive sampling as the sampling technique for this
study. Sampling size was 38 healthcare professionals and 13 patients older than 65 years. This
sampling technique is widely adopted by the researchers for qualitative study. To ensure that the
research design seamlessly reaches its destination, a number of inclusion criteria were followed
(Malterud, Siersma & Guassora, 2016). The researcher ensured that the patients who are being
part of the interview are more than 65 years old, having a good command over English language,
and are capable of taking part in the interview process.
5. Was the data collected in a way that addressed the research issue?
Yes.

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This study required information regarding the dignity of the older patients in hospitals. Thereby,
semi-structured interview was adopted to bring out most relevant information from the patients
as well as the healthcare professionals. Dignity is not only a matter of the patient; the healthcare
staffs are equally responsible for handling the dignity of the patients. The hospital authority must
keep a watchful eye to ensure that the patients are getting dignified care (McCormack &
McCance, 2016). The data collection technique was mainly semi-structured interview conducted
on participants who were 13 patients of 65-91 years, and 38 healthcare professionals. The
interviews were recorded by the researcher so that there is no error in evaluation of the data.
Field notes played a significant role as well because it enables the researcher to gain most
relevant information from the interview. Data saturation was ensured as the data collection
technique was prominent and capable of extracting most accurate information needed for the
study (Palinkas et al. 2015). Collaborative discussion proved to be effective for the research
process as it enabled smooth flow of data. Summary of each of the interview was prepared and
handed over to the respective participants of the interview. Also, each of the participants was
provided with follow-up telephonic interview. Prior to the interview, the participants were
guided thoroughly so that the data collection technique bears the most effective outcome. Written
consent was obtained from each of the participants before starting the interview. Moreover,
interview took place on a mutually agreed time and venue.
8. Was the data analysis sufficiently rigorous?
Yes.
The data analysis was clear and did justice to the research study. The chosen pragmatic thematic
analysis was appropriate for the research study. The transcribed research data obtained from the
interview was read and re-read by two researchers. Codes were created for those data and the
similar codes were arranged to be kept together to make the further assessment easier. The
researchers analysed the data and found relevant themes for different codes. This transformation
made the data analysis less complex. The review of the themes was of much importance as
themes are the backbone of this type of data analysis method (Vaismoradi, Jones, Turunen &
Snelgrove, 2016). At last the themes were named and described in accordance to its functions.
The exchange of mails between the researchers helped them to gain the most effective result.
Larger study information was considered as an important source of relevant research content.

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The coding framework was helpful to address the issues regarding trustworthiness and rigour.
The data analysis highlighted the major implications of this study and the interview data helped
to understand the prevailing situation of the healthcare sector regarding the patient’s dignity. The
contradictory data was taken into account as well to make the research error-free.
9. Is there a clear statement of findings?
Yes.
Research findings of this data are clear and concise and much helpful to meet the aim of
determining the level of dignified care in an acute care environment for older patients. Three
main themes were generated which is considered as key findings of the study. The researcher has
successfully argued to formulate the most prominent outcome. Both positive and negative data
was analysed by the researcher to draw an integrated format of research findings. The research
also contained sufficient evidences which reflected the authenticity of the findings. As findings
are considered as the primary foundation of a research, the researcher has ensured that the
findings are correct and reliable. As the research data was obtained and analysed by more than
one researcher, it can be said that there is no chances of errands. Also, the participants were
provided with summary of their interview sessions, the participants were able to come across
their answers and were able to share their concern regarding the same (Dickson, Riddell,
Gilmour & McCormack, 2017). This provided the researchers with the respondent’s validation,
which directs towards the credibility of the research study. Triangulation also enabled more
credibility on the part of data findings.
10. How valuable is the research?
The research has been able to produce an effective outcome which comprises of the responses
obtained from the patient regarding safeguarding of their dignity. The positive responses reflect
that the situation is gradually improving. Again, the negative response signifies that there is still
room for further improvement in this sector. It has been assessed that the dignity of the patient is
still a problem for the older patients. Despite of certain nurse or care givers being cooperative
and considerate, there are nurses who are not considerate enough regarding the dignity of the
patients. In most of the cases these nurses or care givers are poorly trained. Systematic dignity
related training is highly essential for the healthcare professionals so that the cases of breach of

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dignity can be reduced (Lohne et al. 2017). Although this research highlights considerable
amount of data regarding the study, it is understood that this topic of patient’s dignity requires
more researches. This topic is having a depth which cannot be fulfilled by one or few studies.
More studies are required in future to cover all the aspects of dignified care in acute care
environment. This research has contributed immensely to the current study. Moreover, the
research paved the way of the potential future studies regarding this topic.

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References
Brodtkorb, K., Skisland, A. V. S., Slettebø, Å., & Skaar, R. (2017). Preserving dignity in end-of-
life nursing home care: Some ethical challenges. Nordic Journal of Nursing Research, 37(2), 78-
84.
Dickson, M., Riddell, H., Gilmour, F., & McCormack, B. (2017). Delivering dignified care: A
realist synthesis of evidence that promotes effective listening to and learning from older people's
feedback in acute care settings. Journal of clinical nursing, 26(23-24), 4028-4038.
Lohne, V., Høy, B., Lillestø, B., Sæteren, B., Heggestad, A. K. T., Aasgaard, T., ... & Lindwall,
L. (2017). Fostering dignity in the care of nursing home residents through slow caring. Nursing
ethics, 24(7), 778-788.
Malterud, K., Siersma, V. D., & Guassora, A. D. (2016). Sample size in qualitative interview
studies: guided by information power. Qualitative health research, 26(13), 1753-1760.
McCormack, B., & McCance, T. (Eds.). (2016). Person-centred practice in nursing and health
care: Theory and practice. John Wiley & Sons.
Palinkas, L. A., Horwitz, S. M., Green, C. A., Wisdom, J. P., Duan, N., & Hoagwood, K. (2015).
Purposeful sampling for qualitative data collection and analysis in mixed method implementation
research. Administration and Policy in Mental Health and Mental Health Services
Research, 42(5), 533-544.
Robinson, O. C. (2014). Sampling in interview-based qualitative research: A theoretical and
practical guide. Qualitative research in psychology, 11(1), 25-41.
Vaismoradi, M., Jones, J., Turunen, H., & Snelgrove, S. (2016). Theme development in
qualitative content analysis and thematic analysis. Journal of Nursing Education and
Practice, 6(5), 100.