Implementing Evidence-Based Practice in Healthcare

The use of evidence-base practice (EBP) has steadily grown over the past thirty years, but some hospital systems struggle with politics and organizational cultures that avoid change. It is important for health care leaders to remove barriers and provide an organizational framework of support to promote the use of best practices (Huber, 2014-a). In this post, I will discuss how infrastructure and culture affect implementing evidence-base practice and discuss the how evidence-base practice changes occur in my organization.

Implementing evidence-base practice in organizations is difficult and time-consuming and requires a multi-faceted approach using collaboration across all levels of nursing (Huber, 2014-b). Leaders are critical in developing

Organizational vision and mission statements should link to evidence-based to establish practice change. Organizations hinder evidence-base practice when they fail to recognize staff expertise, refuse to include strategies to promote structure, neglect to link practice changes to quality improvement, and don’t develop educational programs for nurses who are interested in EBP. Because evidence-based practice is complex, it requires the organization to support many inter-connected systems to be successful.

I work in a hospital system that has an extensive system in place to support research, implementation, and evaluation of best practices, thanks in part to Dr. Bernadette Melnyk, who is an expert in the field. Leaders hired Dr. Melnyk in 2011 to evaluate and improve an EBP system that was initiated in 2009. Evidence-base practice now ties together the College of Nursing Research, the Office of Research Practices, the Prior Health Sciences Library, the

(2014-a). Evidence-based practice: strategies for nursing leaders. Leadership and Nursing Care Management, (p. 274). St. Louis Missouri: Elsevier.

Huber, D. (2014-b). Implementing evidence-based practice changes. Leadership and Nursing Care Management, (p. 278). St. Louis Missouri: Elsevier.

OneSource (n.d.). OSUWMC health system evidence-based practice. Retrieved on March 27th, 2016 from https://onesource.osumc.edu/sites/EvidenceBasedPractice/Pages/default.aspx

Stevens, K. (2013). The impact of evidence-based practice in nursing and the next big ideas. The Online Journal of Issues in Nursing, 18(2). Retrieved on March 30th, 2016 from