A Guide to Scholarly Writing in Nursing

A Guide to Scholarly Writing in Nursing

Scholarly writing is the standard format of expressing and sharing detailed ideas in academia. It has a tradition stretching back to the 1600s. The initial goal for academic writing was to ensure proper attribution of ideas to those who conceptualized them. Nowadays standardization of academic writing makes it easy for ideas to be shared across the globe and the approach to this is largely similar across academic fields, including nursing.

Nursing students and professional nurses pursuing postgraduate education have to write papers like research projects, case studies and essays. The papers are completed in order to demonstrate in depth understanding of a topic or share novel ideas for the purpose of passing a class or getting published in journal publications. The process for the latter is much more rigorous as it requires a nurse to pass the review of an editor and his or her peers to get featured in such a publication. A lot more goes into it than the quality of ideas because the number of submissions made by others in nursing education far outweighs the spots for nursing journal article publication.

This fact makes it critical that a nurse develops a habit of consistently producing world class academic nursing writings. It is not always possible to have time to meet this objective. This makes it practically a-must to resort to professional academic nursing writing services such as those we offer as Nursingwritingservices.com. </span >

Competencies Tested in Scholarly Writing in Nursing
 

The types of scholarly papers written in nursing may be different but they all test nursing students on the same four competencies. A nursing student is required to demonstrate that he or she excels in descriptive writing, analytical writing, persuasive writing and critical writing. Skills in these types of writing manifest individually or in combination.

Descriptive writing requires a student or registered nurse to demonstrate competency in detailing facts. It is used in scholarly writing to explain methods of data collection, analysis and share results of such an exercise. Descriptive writing trains the author to be objective as he or she is only detailing observations and that is relevant because objectivity is a required attribute for a successful nursing career.

Analytical writing requires more out of the author. A student will be required to highlight relationships between variables. This requires critical thinking skills to evaluate matters beyond the superficial level. In scholarly writing, an instance where analytical writing comes into play is when discussing the results of a research undertaking.

Persuasive and Critical writing are practically the same. They test the writer on his or her analytical and descriptive writing skills while prompting them to include their own views. So, what is the difference between the two? Persuasive writing requires the writer to only argue out his or her own view as is done in essays. Critical writing tests the writer’s ability to not only argue out his or her own views but also hold them in light of objective evaluation of the views of other authors.

Structure is Key in Scholarly Writing
 

Scholarly writing in nursing emphasizes correct format as intention is to make ideas easily shareable across cultures. This is why scholarly writing is predominantly done in one language. This is not the only standardization that nursing students will have to adhere to. Despite the variety of academic nursing papers, they will all generally have a similar guideline on how to structure the way information is presented. Each bit of information has to go in the correct section otherwise the paper will not be considered a good one. The sections that make up practically all academic papers in nursing are:

1. Title
2. Abstract
3. Introduction
4. Literature Review
5. Conclusion and Recommendations
6. References

There is a slight difference between case studies and research papers on what follows the Literature Review. The latter has the Method, Result and Discussion sections that go into detail on data collection and analysis techniques plus relationships that become evident from the exercise. The former has the Critical Analysis section that provides space for the author to develop his or her arguments on a case study based on evidence observed, of course.

What should go into the other sections? Students are not always sure and end up mixing up information and thus clouding clarity of information presented in their paper. We will briefly go through each section to inform you on what to write the next time you have an academic nursing writing assignment.

Title: The Title is supposed to specifically describe contents of the paper. This means that it should contain all important elements that capture what the paper is about such that an individual who will opt not to read the paper understands what it is about. In the same vein, the Title of a scholarly writing in nursing should never be a teaser. Abstract: The Abstract is another summary section of a scholarly paper. But it is only written after the other sections have been completed. This is because it summarizes the purpose, findings and conclusion of the paper. Background information and citations should never be in the Abstract but Keywords should be present.

Introduction: The Introduction is the section where background information provides context for writing the paper. The problem should be well identified plus goals and justification for solving it. Nursing students should desist from making the Introduction section too long.

Literature Review: This is arguably the section that most individuals in nursing education have a problem writing. The Literature Review indeed tests whether you have a good grasp on scholarly writing. It is supposed to be the section where the author critically evaluates research that has been done around his or her chosen topic. The sources should be authoritative, the extent of citation should be wide yet relevant and both similar and different ideas should be assessed by the author. Unfortunately, many nursing students reduce this section to a chronological listing of past research.

Conclusion and Recommendation: This is a space for the author to include his or her own views. But they must be logically developed from preceding material in the paper. And new ideas should never be introduced when concluding the paper otherwise clarity of information will be lost.

References: This is the final part of scholarly writing. It credits the sources of information that an author has utilized to express his ideas. Failure to properly attribute work is ground for plagiarism, which is right about the worst thing one can do in scholarly writing. The technique used to reference, cite and even organize scholarly writing in nursing is the American Psychological Association (APA) style.

 

 
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Academic Skills in Nursing and Midwifery

Academic Skills in Nursing and Midwifery

Nursing and midwifery are standalone professions in as much as they can be combined. Nurses require formal education and their expertise is required in a wider domain of healthcare services. For instance, nurses improve the quality of patient life in adult nursing. Their function extends beyond clinical knowledge in mental health and children nursing when they support community-based approaches to healthcare services and address child protection issues respectively.

Midwives area of practice is much narrower and they do not typically require formal education. They learn by hands-on experience. Their expertise covers pregnancy, delivery, gynecology and health education in related areas. Despite this high specialty, midwives are critical because child-birth is a defining aspect of women’s healthcare and lives in general.

It is also possible to combine both expertise in the title of nurse-midwife. In the USA, certification for expertise in nursing and midwifery is issued by the American College of Nurse-Midwives (ACNM). Nurse-midwives get deployed in hospitals, clinics and in support of community healthcare. The approach in practice in this field is individualized and non-intervention medical care. </span >

Just as with any professional field, nursing and midwifery selects for individuals with particular attributes. In particular, a nurse-midwife should be someone inclined to help people, has empathy, is detail oriented and can remain composed in stressful situations. One needs to demonstrate academic competency as well and this is achieved by excelling in the following five areas:

1. Time Management
2. Listening
3. Reading
4. Research
5. Writing
6. Examinations

Time Management skills
 

Time management skills is arguably the key component of academic success in nursing and midwifery. It allows an individual to meet all of his or her obligations and aspirations. The basis of managing one’s time properly is setting goals that make it simpler to determine what to prioritize. This makes it possible to meet a variety of deadlines despite varying levels of complexities of tasks to be done.

Schedules are the tools used to ensure adherence to proper time management. Nurses and midwives use both weekly and daily planners to allocate themselves enough time to attend to patients. This is necessary because their time is usually constrained by a heavy demand for their services or presence. In addition to actual medical care, they have to spend up to 35% of their time carrying out documentation as part of their administrative duties.

Listening Skills
 

Listening is a necessary academic skill in nursing and midwifery because a student will spend a fair share of his time attending lectures. Information on course plans and tips on how to excel in the course will often be shared in lecture halls. This means that in addition to developing the discipline to attend lectures, one is required to fully concentrate on the lecturer’s words when in attendance.

How can you know that you are actively listening to a lecture? The only way is by demonstrating proactiveness to the matter being discussed. This can be done by taking notes to highlight the most important bits of information. The other way is by being proactive and turning the communication into a discussion at every chance you get - like asking questions.

Reading Skills
 

A student of nursing and midwifery should set his goals for reading in order to make the most out of the activity. A goal of reading could be to go through advanced content, comprehend a concept, understand details or instruction and to come across new ideas. The information derived from these goals is then instilled by use of the 3Rs approach of Read, Recite and Review.

Use of schedules and reading plenty of material will get even more out of the reading experience. It is also a good habit to be courageous enough to expose oneself to even more challenging topics and styles of writing in nursing and midwifery. This is a way to become a well-rounded student.

Research Skills
 

Research is a defining feature of academia. All students in nursing and midwifery should be able to collect data, interpret and evaluate its meaning. This should be topped by being able to present the information to the intended audience. The presentation may be oral, requiring use of visual tools like presentation software. Presentation may also be in written form, as is typically the case, to be reviewed by other academics.

It is impossible to conduct good research without good sources of data. Data has to be derived from authoritative sources for it to pass standards required in academia. Therefore, research encourages analytical thinking to make decisions on what to trust. Nevertheless, sources of data for nursing and midwifery remain broad with the web, journals and textbooks being just a few mines of information.

 

Writing Skills
 

There are different types of academic nursing writing that would each need their own articles to comprehensively go over. But they all test nursing and midwifery students on the same writing skills. Students should be able to evaluate literature through critical writing. He or she should also be able to share objective information by descriptive writing and assess relationships between variables through analytical writing. Last but not least, a student should be able to make a case for his or her own views and ideas through persuasive writing.

A research paper will require these competencies to be demonstrated in different sections of the writing. The sections of a research paper are:

SECTION

WHAT TO BE ADDRESSED

TITLE

Topic being studied

ABSTRACT

Summary of findings of the study

INTRODUCTION

Justification and context for study

LITERATURE REVIEW

Critical evaluation of related studies

METHOD

Data collection technique

RESULTS

Finding from measurement of data

DISCUSSION

Analysis of result

RECOMMENDATION

Conclusion drawn from result

REFERENCES

Sources of information

Examination Skills
 

Examinations make students anxious and many have even suggested that exams should be done away with. But they remain a standard way of objectively assessing the competencies of students in a field of study. Students who wish to excel in examinations need to understand that preparation is the key. And this takes many forms - from healthy living to developing a study.

 
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Writing as a Professional Nurse

Writing as a Professional Nurse

Writing in the profession of writing is majorly about documenting knowledge. This manifests as record keeping to ensure every step of a treatment plan is comprehensively captured. The documented work is necessary for coordinating allocation of hospital resources, charting treatment plans and guiding the approach to be used for similar circumstances in the future.

A professional nurse should also expect to be involved in academic nursing writing. Therefore, the knowledge developed in this domain during the years of study should not be discarded. Progress in academic qualification status opens the door for a nurse to move up the ladder in his or her career to achieve more fulfilment in terms of nursing practice and income. An example of writing professional nurses do is a concept analysis paper.

Academic nursing writing puts the analytical skills of a professional nurse to the test. The nurse needs to demonstrate his or her knowledge of a concept by reviewing work done by other researchers, in the particular field, and coming up with his or her own conclusions from the information compiled. Exploring research is a difficult activity because it requires a lot of reading and intuition to identify research that is related to the topic one is analyzing or carrying out a study on.

The stress of academic nursing writing has pushed many professional nurses to opt for professional nursing writing services. Nursingwritingservices.com is the best nursing writing services provider in the USA. We not only write but help our customers conceptualize topics and edit their work. </span >

What are the Challenges of Writing as a Professional Nurse?
 

Our experience in handling nursing essays for practicing nurses has led us to find out that the main writing challenge professional nurses face is a lack of time. They are distracted by their duties, such as administering medication, so they end up making writing mistakes. Nurses are also typically busy and find it difficult to appropriately dedicate time to complete academic nursing writing assignments.

Other nurses are not well-educated on scholarly nursing writing and as such are never able to write proper nursing essays. It takes years of practice to familiarize oneself with all the traditions or formats in academic nursing writing. This will present a problem because there is no such room for learning when nursing writing assignments are required within tight timelines.

The workaround by Nursingwritingservices.com to the problem has been to employ registered nurses, from the USA and UK, who are adept at scholarly nursing writing to address the problem for our customers. They start working on customer orders immediately so never suffer from a lack of time either. The customer reviews we receive is evidence of us keeping our promise of quality nursing writing and all done in good time.

Writing and Career Development for Professional Nurses
 

Communication skills are one of the competencies that an individual needs to succeed in the career of nursing. Writing skill is one aspect of communication but it is put to use a disproportionate amount of time, as aforementioned. Writing communicates the appropriate information to colleagues, patients and their families.

Analytical nursing writing helps a professional nurse further develop his or her critical thinking skills. This will improve his or her decision making when it comes to the strategic choice of a treatment plan or the tactical decision of applying a technique to aid a patient suffering from a disease or in pain from an injury. When this skill is accredited through attainment of higher, so to speak, academic qualification then a professional nurse will get to a career status of working autonomously. This is removed from the common yet wrong perception of nurses as merely helping hands for physicians.

The best practices for every professional nurse to follow when writing are as listed and further explained below:

1. Following Proper Format
2. Being Objective
3. Being Logical
4. Following Grammar Rules

It is important to write with the audience in mind. Typically, in nursing, there will be tradition on how every type of writing should be presented. In the professional setting, this may be further defined by the culture in the institution a nurse is deployed. Adhering to these traditions or format of writing makes it more convenient to put your message across to your colleagues. This will develop the organization skills of any professional nurse as well.

Academic nursing writing is more complex when it comes to format. The formats that have been established as norms for different types of academic nursing writing have to be identifiable by nurses and evaluators anywhere on the globe. Research is the most common type of writing done by professional nurses and its format will be familiar. Unfortunately, even professional nurses find it difficult to present their research in the appropriate format because of the aforementioned challenges of time and inexperience.

A nursing research paper consists of the Title, Abstract, Introduction, Literature Review, Methodology, Results, Discussion, Conclusion and References sections. The advice that students get over these sections remains the same for professional nurses. Analytical, Critical, Persuasive and Descriptive writing skills must manifest in the appropriate sections.

A professional nurse should ensure that his or her writing is objective. This is achieved by excluding emotion and opinion, such as using ‘I’ and ‘We’, when carrying out writing assignments. The objectivity is necessary because professional nursing writing serves as a data point to guide future treatment plans.

Part of objectivity is ensuring that all writing is detailed enough to include all relevant happenings. There should be no phrases included that can be deleted and meaning is retained. Detail is important for audit purposes because the writing can be used as evidence in a court of law. The details should be written down in a logical manner that prevents confusion in meaning to colleagues and patients.

It goes without saying that the grammar rules should be followed. The correct tone and proper words are needed to accurately express meaning. All in all, practice is what will lead to a professional nurse becoming a better writer.

 

 
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Nursing Concept Analysis Paper

Nursing Concept Analysis Paper

A concept analysis paper is an essay written to convey meaning or understanding of a concept. It is a writing done across all academic fields. The overall goals of writing such essays remain similar across all academic fields. Besides clarifying the meaning of an idea, concept analysis papers help to reveal relationships between concepts or problems.

Both students and nurses find it challenging to write proper nursing concept analysis papers. This is because it requires extensive research and demonstration of critical thinking skills. Nursing students and professional nurses who are not experienced enough with scholarly writing will find a hard time in properly focusing their research. Similarly, they will find it difficult to express their ideas in the appropriate manner.

Therefore, it should come as no surprise that many nursing students and even professional nurses opt for professional assistance to write concept analysis essays. This task is not as straightforward as it looks. It is difficult to find a reliable and trustworthy academic nursing writing services provider online and offline. Nursingwritingservices.com is one of the few nursing writing services providers that meets both criteria. Many students and nurses from the USA, UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and a selection of other countries from across the globe benefit from what we do. </span >

A nursing concept analysis paper is just one of the types of academic nursing writing that we do for our customers. Our expert writers follow the recommended step below to produce world class quality concept analysis essays:

1. Identify Concept
2. escribe Characteristics
3. Collect Data
4. Describe Antecedent and Consequence
5. Demonstrate a Model Case
6. Make the Presentation

These steps ensure that a concept is well-defined, its attributes are measurable and that a manifestation of the concept is demonstrated.

Step One: Identify Concept

Of course, the concept analysis paper must begin by selection or identification of the idea to be studied in detail. The concept may either be set by the evaluator or it becomes the duty of the student or nurse to determine what to analyze. The topic selected must be in relation to nursing and it is best to pick one covered in your particular area of study. Things get even better if the student or nurse selects a topic he or she has an interest in.

Ideas on concepts to analyze include HIV/Aids Education, Patient Turnover and Communication in Nursing. Evaluators not only consider the topic selected but they also want the purpose or aims of the nursing concept analysis paper to be spelled out when identifying concepts to be studied. A justification for the topic selected must also be written out when opening the analysis essay.

Step Two: Describe Characteristics of the Concept

The first phase in simplifying the concept is describing the characteristics or attributes of the concept. This is done by listing terms related to the concept. This helps highlight phrases that are wrongly used interchangeably to describe phenomena, for example. The listing of related terms is done from memory, by asking colleagues and having a look at a dictionary.

This should be simple enough but it is not a step to be belittled. You will only pass your nursing concept analysis paper if you have been exhaustive in listing down the attributes of your concept. Being comprehensive in listing characteristics of a concept demonstrates to the evaluator that good research was carried out. The attributes should also logically be related to the concept in question and their definition to be succinct as possible.

Step Three: Collect Data

Data collection is needed in writing concept analysis essays because it is the tool for revealing new knowledge or inconsistencies in established thought. The way to collect data in this context is by carrying out a literature review. This is why it is important for students to train on how to carry out a literature review. Many nursing students mistake it for a chronological listing of previous research when it is really about critically evaluating previous research.

A good nursing concept analysis paper includes related concepts in its literature review. This demonstrates the breadth of research work that has been carried out. Going together with the need to be sufficiently sourced, the data should only be collected from authoritative sources. Examples of authoritative sources of data include journals and academic books.

Step Four: Describe Antecedent and Consequence

Antecedents describe issues leading to the concept while consequences are issues that result or follow from the concept. Detailing antecedents and consequences in a concept analysis paper allows the author to transition the issue from the theoretical to something practical that will guide nursing practice.

How does this work? When issues leading to and resulting from the concept become known then it becomes possible to make the concept measurable. There will be more accuracy in determining the degree to which actual events meet the definition of the concept.

Step Five: Demonstrate a Model Case

The last bit of a nursing concept analysis paper is completing the transition of the idea from a theory to demonstrating practical application. This will be possible because the concept has become well-defined and the characteristics that qualify a phenomena to be defined as the concept are also clear. There should be no attributes identified that were not identified in the concept characteristics description phase.

The model case should logically fit the definition of the concept in order to meet the evidence-based approach to study and practice that is found in nursing.

Related to all of the above, it is necessary that the author of a nursing concept analysis paper ensure that he or she has stuck to the proper research format in nursing. This includes using the American Psychological Association (APA) citation method and adhering to English Grammar rules.

 

 
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Writing Skills in Nursing and Healthcare

Writing Skills in Nursing and Healthcare

Writing skills in nursing extend beyond the classroom. A nurse is expected to have excellent communication skills and writing is one aspect of this. It will manifest in the engagements that a nurse is expected to make with colleagues, patients, their families and the wider community. The practice of nursing involves writing plenty of educational or informational material. This can only be done successfully on the back of developing writing skills in the classroom.

Class work involves different types of academic nursing writing that test students on different areas or competencies. The most common orders we receive at Nursingwritingservices.com are for research papers, term papers, case studies, review papers, reports and Professional Development Plans (PDP). A lot of students find completion of these works quite stressful and rightly so because they are complex undertakings.

Our academic nursing writing services make up for the shortfall in writing skills that many students face. We are a better alternative than resorting to vices like plagiarism. Our writing services have also proven to be of value to nursing students who do not speak English as a first language and those who are unable to find time to commit to writing their nursing assignments. In fact, opting for the professional writing assistance of Nursingwritingservices.com has freed time for our customers to focus on other areas of their study such as practicals.

What makes our services top tier is that we hold customer satisfaction as our greatest value. It starts by ensuring that we only employ the best qualified Registered nurses from the USA and UK to work on your nursing writing assignments. We also have exceptional customer support in place. We are available 24/7 and offer additional goodies like allowing you to chat with the writer working on your assignment.

The positive customer reviews we get plus the fact that we are accredited by BBB-USA (Best Business Bureau USA) is testament to the world class quality work that we do. </span >

What it takes to be a good nursing writer
 

Academic nursing writing develops writing skills in four areas that define the day-to-day work of a nurse. The four areas are listed below:

1. Description
2. Analysis
3. Critical Thinking
4. Persuasion

Descriptive writing skills are mostly in use when detailing the method of data collection and analysis. It requires only facts from the nursing student. Excelling in this area of academic nursing writing becomes more useful, for example, when describing a treatment plan to a patient. The intended outcome will only be realized if the information is laid out in a factual yet easy-to-follow manner.

Analytical writing manifests when reviewing the results of a research undertaking or drawing conclusions from an observation. A nursing student is expected to be able to highlight relationships between or among variables. A practicing nurse uses the skill not only to write but also to evaluate patients and make correct decisions.

Critical writing is typically reserved for the Literature Review. This section of academic nursing writing is supposed to be an evaluation of research done in the particular area of study. A nurse or a student should be able to communicate whether or not they agree with the conclusions of any of the studies. Unfortunately, many nursing students confuse Literature Review to be a section for sequentially listing past research. This area stands out as one to watch out for with regards to writing skills.

There is not a lot of room in academic nursing writing for the author’s personal views. It is important for research to be objective. But writing skills in persuasion get to be developed when writing the discussion section of a research paper. This section provides an opening for the students or the nurse to add onto the research a bit of his recommendation or input. Developing this writing skill becomes useful when dealing with a wide range of patients - in terms of their cultural backgrounds and personal attributes.

More nursing writing skills
 

One of the important components of a well-written nursing manuscript is good research. What defines good research? It should be extensive yet relevant. Good research demonstrated that a nurse or a student has a great grasp of the topic and has considered all relevant variables or offshoots. At the same time, research should be relevant to ensure that the writing will be appropriately focused.

Students who are unable to focus their topic find it difficult to organize their work. It is never clear what objectives are being pursued and how the literature review contributed to their realization. This will leave the assessor no choice but to fail the writing.

Another aspect of writing skills in nursing that should receive more attention is appropriate use of language. The fact that a manuscript has been completed in English can never be enough. The right words have to be picked to convey the exact message as there are many English words with double meaning. The tone should be formal as well rather than the informal language that a student or a nurse will be used to in their daily lives.

Consistently meeting this requirement is a tall order for most students and even professional nurses since they are not experienced enough in academic nursing writing. Professional help from Nursingwritingservices.com comes in handy during such instances.

It goes without saying that each of the different types of writing assignments carried out in the nursing specialties come with their own format. An academic nursing writing piece is not complete if the correct format is not adhered to. Students and nurses can always use samples of previous works by themselves or others until they get familiar with what is expected of them in terms of format.

 

 
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