Research Methods 2- developing questionnaire/proforma

Question 1

What is research?

Answer 1

A study which is trying to generate new knowledge about patients or conditions or healthcare
services which is applicable to a wider population.

Question 2

What is service evaluation?

Answer 2

Evaluate or assess some part of a local healthcare service

The aim is to improve the service based on the evidence that you collect

Results from your project will only feed back into this particular service, they will not apply to
patients, or services, across the country

Any method can be used to evaluate a service
AKA service improvement, quality improvement

Question 3

What is a clinical audit?

Answer 3

a quality improvement process that seeks to improve patient care and outcomes through systematic review of care against explicit criteria and the implementation of change

Question 4

What are the 5 steps in a clinical audit?

Answer 4

Identify - What are we trying to achieve? - guidelines, evidence, patient and public involvement, agree standards and process design

Method - other information to measure achievement - questionnaire, data collection and sampling

Analyse - are we achieving it now? Why are we not achieving it? - facilitation

Change - do something to make it better - change management, benchmarking, process redesign

Monitor - Have things improved? Data collecti

Question 5

What are the best methods for finding out answers to audit aims?

Answer 5

Patint notes/records review
Survery of staff and patients
Interviews - telephone or face to face
Focus groups

Question 6

How is confidentiality maintained in a clinical audit

Answer 6

NO PATIENT IDENTIFIERS can leave the clinical environment
◦ Use anonymous patient notes/data if possible
◦ If non-anonymous, anonymise as soon as is possible and thereafter use anonymous participant numbers
◦ Collect all data and immediately anonymise in one go if possible

Question 7

What must the data collected from patient note reviews be?

Answer 7

Data may be categorical (Y/N) or on a continuous scale (e.g. blood pressure)

Question 8

What are likert scales?

Answer 8

Respondents specify level of agreement or disagreement

on a symmetric scale for a series of statements.

Question 9

What are some assumptions made by likert scales? [4]

Answer 9

1. Bipolar scaling method, measuring either positive or negative response to a statement
2. Likert scaling assumes distances between each response are equal, (also called interval level data)
3. Each response gets a number e.g. 1 to 5
4. Usually multiple statements, all related to each other, are posed
5. Scores are summed across statements to form a scale – all items have equal weight

Question 10

Describe the clinical audit cycle

Answer 10

Identify 
Method
Analyse 
Change
Monitor

Question 11

Which data sources are available for audits?​

Answer 11

Telephone interviews ​
medical notes ​
Staff survey ​
focus groups ​
interviews

Question 12

What are the different questionnaire question types ?

Answer 12

Open ​
closed statements ​
binary

Question 13

What is social desirability bias ?

Answer 13

Respondent provides the politically correct social desirable answer as opposed to their true answer.