Evidence-based practice (EBP) is a systematic approach to patient care decision-making based on current, best available evidence.
The first step in EBP involves re-phrasing a clinical problem/area/issue in the form of a focused, searchable, and answerable clinical question.
The PICOT Grid is a framework to help you accomplish this step.
Information on clinical problems/issues within your textbooks provide a wealth of material for generating and brainstorming ideas for PICOT Questions.
In your Concepts for Nursing Practice text, check the Clinical Management sections within each chapter for potential ideas.
Also, be sure to review Chapter 3.3 Formulating EBP Questions in your Evidence-Based Practice for Nurses text.
Copies of both books are on reserve in the Mulford Library. To use a copy in the library, please ask a staff member at the library front desk.
Helpful web resources for PICOT question ideas can be accessed below:
Let's consider the following clinical scenario:
You are an oncology nurse and you notice a great amount of fatigue in many of the cancer patients that you see. While at a recent nursing conference, you attended a session on the use of yoga in managing fatigue in general. You are curious if yoga could be effective in cancer patients' fatigue. You take this idea back to your hospital's Nursing Research Council who then decided to implement this as an EBP project to see if yoga improves cancer patients' fatigue in 6 months.
The following PICOT Grid serves as a framework for rephrasing your scenario into a clinical question:
| PICOT Grid | |
| In (P) | cancer patients with fatigue |
| what is the effect of (I) | yoga |
| compared with (C) | usual care |
| on (O) | quality of life |
| within (T) | 6 months |
You now have a focused, searchable, and well-built clinical question:
"In cancer patients with fatigue (P), what is the effect of yoga (I), compared with usual care (C), on quality of life (O) within 6 months (T)?"
This PICOT question can then be used to develop comprehensive search terms in library databases to locate relevant research evidence to support your PICOT.
