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Outlining and dictating scientific manuscripts is a useful method for health researchers: A focus group interview.

ABSTRACT: Background:Young researchers may experience difficulties when writing scientific articles for publication in biomedical journals. Various methods may facilitate the writing process including outlining the paper before the actual writing and using dictation instead of writing the first draft. The aim of this study was to investigate the experiences and difficulties for young, experienced researchers when writing articles using a detailed outline and dictation of the first draft. Methods:We used qualitative focus group interviews and the study was reported according to the COnsolidated criteria for REporting Qualitative research guideline. Participants were sampled from a group of researchers participating in a writing retreat/course. The interviews were recorded on a digital recorder and transcribed. The text was analyzed according to content analysis and coded and condensed into themes and subthemes. Groups of participants were added until data saturation was reached. Results:A total of 14 researchers participated (9 women and 5 men). Their clinical experience was median (range) of 6 (1-11)?years since graduation from medical school. Two themes arose during the analyses of the data: "Process guidance with the outline as the map" and "arrival at dictation." The outline was used in the preparation phase leading up to the day of dictation and was used in collaboration with co-authors and supervisors. The participants found it to be a useful tool for preparing the manuscript and dictating their initial first full draft. Conclusion:Experienced young researchers found beneficial effects of using a structured outline to prepare for dictation of scientific articles. The outline was a tool that would develop in close collaboration with co-authors and mentors. With dictation, a full first draft of a manuscript can be produced in a few hours. Participants positively evaluated this structured and reproducible way of producing scientific articles.

SUBMITTER: Andresen K

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5971377 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Outlining and dictating scientific manuscripts is a useful method for health researchers: A focus group interview.

Andresen Kristoffer K Laursen Jannie J Rosenberg Jacob J

SAGE open medicine 20180525

<h4>Background</h4>Young researchers may experience difficulties when writing scientific articles for publication in biomedical journals. Various methods may facilitate the writing process including outlining the paper before the actual writing and using dictation instead of writing the first draft. The aim of this study was to investigate the experiences and difficulties for young, experienced researchers when writing articles using a detailed outline and dictation of the first draft.<h4>Method ...[more]

PMID: 29854402

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Project description:BACKGROUND:A range of digital technologies are available to lay people to find, share, and generate health-related information. Few studies have directed attention specifically to how women are using these technologies from the diverse array available to them. Even fewer have focused on Australian women's use of digital health. OBJECTIVE:The Australian Women and Digital Health Project aimed to investigate which types of digital technologies women used regularly for health-related purposes and which they found most helpful and useful. Qualitative methods-semistructured interviews and focus groups-were employed to shed light on the situated complexities of the participants' enactments of digital health technologies. The project adopted a feminist new materialism theoretical perspective, focusing on the affordances, relational connections, and affective forces that came together to open up or close off the agential capacities generated with and through these enactments. METHODS:The project comprised two separate studies including a total of 66 women. In study 1, 36 women living in the city of Canberra took part in face-to-face interviews and focus groups, while study 2 involved telephone interviews with 30 women from other areas of Australia. RESULTS:The affordances of search engines to locate health information and websites and social media platforms for providing information and peer support were highly used and valued. Affective forces such as the desire for trust, motivation, empowerment, reassurance, control, care, and connection emerged in the participants' accounts. Agential capacities generated with and through digital health technologies included the capacity to seek and generate information and create a better sense of knowledge and expertise about bodies, illness, and health care, including the women's own bodies and health, that of their families and friends, and that of their often anonymous online social networks. The participants referred time and again to appreciating the feelings of agency and control that using digital health technologies afforded them. When the technologies failed to work as expected, these agential capacities were not realized. Women responded with feelings of frustration, disappointment, and annoyance, leading them to become disenchanted with the possibilities of the digital technologies they had tried. CONCLUSIONS:The findings demonstrate the nuanced and complex ways in which the participants were engaging with and contributing to online sources of information and using these sources together with face-to-face encounters with doctors and other health care professionals and friends and family members. They highlight the lay forms of expertise that the women had developed in finding, assessing, and creating health knowledges. The study also emphasized the key role that many women play in providing advice and health care for family members not only as digitally engaged patients but also as digitally engaged carers.

Project description:The digital era has seen rapid changes in how information is consumed. Traditional dissemination of scholarly work through biomedical journals may not be optimally tailored to the preferences of younger clinicians and researchers. We aimed to describe the perspectives of young clinicians and researchers in kidney disease on consuming scientific information. Three focus groups were conducted during the 2017 American Society of Nephrology Kidney Week with a total of 29 nephrologists and researchers (ages 40 years old and younger) purposively sampled through our networks and the American Society of Nephrology registration database. Data were analyzed thematically. Of the 72 participants invited, 29 participated from 28 centers across 13 countries. Five themes were identified: capturing and retaining attention (with subthemes of triggering interest, optimizing readability, and navigation to sustain motivation); having discernible relevance (resonating with clinical and research interests, supporting professional development, action-oriented and readily applicable, able to disseminate, contextualizing the study, and filtering out informational noise); immediacy and efficiency in processing information (requiring instantaneous and easy access, enabling rapid understanding, and facilitating comprehension of complex concepts); trusting legitimate and credible sources (authoritative indicator of importance and quality, reputable experts broadening perspective, certainty and confidence with collegial input, accurate framing and translation of the message, ascertaining methodologic detail and nuances, and integrating the patient perspective); and social dialoguing and debate. Immediate and digitally optimized access motivated young kidney professionals to consume scientific information. Mechanisms that enable them to distil relevant and new evidence, appraise and apply information to clinical practice and research, disseminate studies to colleagues, and engage in discussion and debate may enhance their comprehension, confidence, interpretation, and use of scientific literature.

Project description:ObjectivesTo investigate different professionals' (nurse anaesthetists', anaesthesiologists', and postanaesthesia care unit nurses') descriptions of and reflections on the postoperative handover.DesignA focus group interview study with a descriptive design using qualitative content analysis of transcripts.SettingOne anaesthetic clinic at two hospitals in Sweden.ParticipantsSix focus groups with 23 healthcare professionals involved in postoperative handovers. Each group was homogeneous regarding participant profession, resulting in two groups per profession: nurse anaesthetists (n=8), anaesthesiologists (n=7) and postanaesthesia care unit nurses (n=8).ResultsPatterns and five categories emerged: (1) having different temporal foci during handover, (2) insecurity when information is transferred from one team to another, (3) striving to ensure quality of the handover, (4) weighing the advantages and disadvantages of the bedside handover and (5) having different perspectives on the transfer of responsibility. The professionals' perceptions of the postoperative handover differed with regard to temporal foci and transfer of responsibility. All professional groups were insecure about having all information needed to ensure the quality of care. They strived to ensure quality of the handover by: focusing on matters that deviated from the normal course of events, aiding memory through structure and written information and cooperating within and between teams. They reported that the bedside handover enhances their control of the patient but also that it could threaten the patient's privacy and that frequent interruptions could be disturbing.ConclusionsThe present findings revealed variations in different professionals' views on the postoperative handover. Healthcare interventions are needed to minimise the gap between professionals' perceptions and practices and to achieve a shared understanding of postoperative handover. Furthermore, to ensure high-quality and safe care, stakeholders/decision makers need to pay attention to the environment and infrastructure in postanaesthesia care.

Project description:Purpose:To describe the experiences of non-medical discipline staff of difficulties and possibilities in inter-professional communication within the radiology department and remitting departments. Materials and Methods:Three focus group interviews were conducted with 16 non-medical discipline staff in a radiology department at a university hospital in Sweden. Data were analysed using qualitative content analysis. Results:The experiences of inter-professional communication by non-medical discipline staff within the radiology department and with remitting departments can be described in three categories, and six sub categories. The informants experienced difficulties in both oral and written inter-professional communication. Inadequate structures, incorrect information and unclear language in the referral forms, lack of feedback from clinicians and radiologists, and reduced face-to-face communication were described as factors that negatively influenced communication. Other difficulties were time shortage, inadequate routines and economy issues. The possibilities described were use of face-to-face communication, interpreters, and clear and well-structured referral forms. Conclusion:Non-medical staff experience that quality in inter-professional communication has a significant impact on health outcomes and patient safety. They expressed a number of difficulties in both written and oral inter-professional communication. For example inadequate written and oral communication, as well as practical issues such as routine could negatively influence the quality of the outcome of inter-professional communication. Lack of feedback from clinicians and radiologists and reduced face-to-face communication were also mentioned as factors that influence oral communication. Possibilities described to improve inter-professional communication quality and thus patient safety were professional contact on both professional and personal levels, use of interpreters, and clear and well-structured referral forms. The results of this study add to our knowledge of the difficulties and possibilities in non-medical inter-professional communication, which may enhance both safety and health outcomes for patients if implemented. Future studies in interprofessional communication is needed.

Project description:ObjectiveTo explore the effects of the UK Working Time Regulations (WTR) on trainee doctors' experience of fatigue.DesignQualitative study involving focus groups and telephone interviews, conducted in Spring 2012 with doctors purposively selected from Foundation and specialty training. Final compliance with a 48 h/week limit had been required for trainee doctors since August 2009. Framework analysis of data.Setting9 deaneries in all four UK nations; secondary care.Participants82 doctors: 53 Foundation trainees and 29 specialty trainees. 36 participants were male and 46 female. Specialty trainees were from a wide range of medical and surgical specialties, and psychiatry.ResultsImplementation of the WTR, while acknowledged as an improvement to the earlier situation of prolonged excessive hours, has not wholly overcome experience of long working hours and fatigue. Fatigue did not only arise from the hours that were scheduled, but also from an unpredictable mixture of shifts, work intensity (which often resulted in educational tasks being taken home) and inadequate rest. Fatigue was also caused by trainees working beyond their scheduled hours, for reasons such as task completion, accessing additional educational opportunities beyond scheduled hours and staffing shortages. There were also organisational, professional and cultural drivers, such as a sense of responsibility to patients and colleagues and the expectations of seniors. Fatigue was perceived to affect efficiency of skills and judgement, mood and learning capacity.ConclusionsLong-term risks of continued stress and fatigue, for doctors and for the effective delivery of a healthcare service, should not be ignored. Current monitoring processes do not reflect doctors' true working patterns. The effectiveness of the WTR cannot be considered in isolation from the culture and context of the workplace. On-going attention needs to be paid to broader cultural issues, including the relationship between trainees and seniors.

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Outlining and dictating scientific manuscripts is a useful method for health researchers: A focus group interview.

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Outlining and dictating scientific manuscripts is a useful method for health researchers: A focus group interview.

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