Organizational culture and policies on Evidence Based Practice
The primary goal of Evidence-Based Practice is to improve the quality of care through improved patient outcome and satisfaction. Despite the efforts put in place by organizations to ensure adoption and implementation of EBP, the quality of care lags behind. The percentage of readmissions and patients acquiring hospital-based infections remain high, an indication of low efficiency and effectiveness of the evidence-based practices put in place. According to Williams, Perillo & Brown (2015), some of the facilitating factors to the failure of EBP in organizations is the culture and the organizational policies which do not support the new methods.
Some of the organizational barriers inhibiting caregivers from conducting EBP are unfavorable working environment setting, lack of support from those in power, infrastructure and facilities that will support them to incorporate research into their daily practices. Barriers as a result unfavorable organizational culture and policies affect even the competent and motivated care providers influencing their ability to integrate the use of EBP in the course of their practice (Ammouri et al., 2014). Lack of sufficient time to carry out training concerning the new methods based on evidence from theory and research has made the use of EBP in most organizations more difficult. Results are care providers are not well equipped with knowledge and skills to perform EBP effectively. In case of studies concerning the influence of organizational culture and policies on EPB, the results will be disseminated through hard prints and copies supplied to different departments in the organizations.
Changing the institutional culture and policies to fit EBP may not be easy because it involves a change in many processes and mindset. For the culture of EBP to be adopted in the organization, there is a need for collaboration from all levels of management to the caregivers on the ground (Reeves et al., 2015). Policies ought to be evaluated and structure of the organization reviewed to one that favors implementation of EBP by providing necessary resources, environment, time, facilities and training. For nurses to promote quality of care and patient outcome through EBP, they need to be updated regarding clinical education and current researchers. Learning and being equipped with skills on EBP will allow the nurses to be influential in the clinical areas through the improved patient outcomes.
Reference
Ammouri, A. A., Raddaha, A. A., Dsouza, P., Geethakrishnan, R., Noronha, J. A., Obeidat, A.
A., & Shakman, L. (2014). Evidence-based practice: Knowledge, attitudes, practice and
perceived barriers among nurses in Oman. Sultan Qaboos University Medical
Journal, 14(4), e537.
Reeves, S., Pelone, F., Harrison, R., Goldman, J., & Zwarenstein, M. (2017). Interprofessional
collaboration to improve professional practice and healthcare outcomes. The Cochrane
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Williams, B., Perillo, S., & Brown, T. (2015). What are the factors of organisational culture in
health care settings that act as barriers to the implementation of evidence-based practice?
A scoping review. Nurse education today, 35(2), e34-e41.
