Literature Review of a Quality Healthcare Improvement Initiative

Description of the Capstone Project

. This culminating experience requires students to apply knowledge and skills obtained throughout their graduate studies to identify and analyze quality improvement initiatives in healthcare. Students will complete a project that demonstrates their ability to independently conduct research, thoughtfully evaluate data, synthesize information and present important findings. Students successfully completing the project will be armed with quality improvement knowledge and skills that will serve them, their employers, and their patients well when they enter the workforce.

The capstone project unfolds over the course of several semesters and is designed to build upon graduate coursework in the didactic year students will work independently to identify a specific healthcare quality improvement initiative, well-supported by evidence-based medicine, aimed at improving the effectiveness and reliability of health processes and outcomes. With guidance from faculty mentors as well as their own comprehensive analysis of key research supporting the identified quality improvement initiative, students will design a robust survey tool to assess whether providers in the medical community are implementing the recommended quality improvement measure(s) as well as identify barriers to such implementation, if applicable. The capstone project will culminate with a graded written paper that effectively summarizes research and survey results as well as an oral presentation delivered to peers and the faculty.

Capstone projects will be developed by students, with ongoing feedback from capstone mentors, and will include:

1. 1)  Identification and description of a quality improvement initiative, well supported in the literature, aimed at improving the effectiveness and reliability of health processes and outcomes
2. 2)  Effective utilization, synthesis and reporting of key scholarly research in a way that demonstrates depth of understanding of the disease process that the quality initiative is designed to improve, current best practices in management, and goals for improving patient outcomes
3. 3)  Design of a robust survey tool to assess implementation of the quality initiative in clinical practice as well as identify barriers to such implementation, if applicable
4. 4)  Administration of survey tool to a minimum of ten medical providers who likely manage patients with the particular disease state that the quality initiative is designed to improve
5. 5)  Critical analysis of research and survey results to include effective reporting of findings as well as well- supported conclusions
6. 6)  Recommendations that may improve the acceptance and implementation of the quality indicator in health care practice
7. 7)  Design of an abstract that effectively and succinctly communicates the purpose, methods, results, and conclusions of the capstone project
8. 8)  Submission of an outline, survey, first draft and final written paper that meet all the requirements of the posted grading rubrics, including a high caliber use of written language and proper APA style formatting
9. 9)  Effective oral presentation of capstone project to peers and faculty that meets all the requirements of the grading rubric

Guidelines for Preparation of Written Capstone Paper

The following guidelines will assist in the preparation of the Capstone paper. In addition, it is recommended that each student acquire a copy of the APA manual, 6th edition to use as reference.

The Literature Review

All projects should be of interest to PA professionals and be based on relevant medical literature from peer-reviewed journals. A minimum of 10 references that are current (less than 5 years old) are required. Many papers will require additional references for completeness. Older articles may be used but must be relevant to current practice standards.

PubMed contains citations on biomedical literature. If full text access of a journal article is not available, please contact the main library to obtain an interlibrary loan of the article. See Appendix D for more information on conducting a search on PubMed. Additional resources include: Cochrane Reviews and Google Scholar.

Avoid the use of non-refereed journals and lay publications. Up-to-Date, WebMD, eMedicine or the like are not acceptable references for this project.

Your literature review should be broad enough for a clear understanding of the disease state; however, the main focus of your review and of the capstone project in general is the quality improvement initiative designed to improve the effectiveness and reliability of health processes and outcomes pertinent to the disease state. The literature review should include evidence supporting the quality improvement initiative, the potential benefits of the initiative being implemented as well as any barriers to implementation.

Order of Final Paper

The main body of the final paper should be no less than 12 pages. Follow APA guidelines: 12pt Times New Roman font, double spaced. (See Appendix A for additional information).

1. Title page: Include the title of the Capstone Project, your full name (including full middle name), the institution, and the year of completion. This is page number one.
2. Abstract: 200-250 words
   1. The 200 – 250 word count includes articles (a, an, the), prepositions (on, in, with) and

heading words (see below). It does not include the project title. The abstract should be structured and include Purpose (include description of the QI initiative and its relevance), Methods (include literature search and survey methodology), Results (include summation of findings) and Conclusions (include well-supported conclusions and any recommendations regarding implementation of QI initiative).

1. 1. This page is always the second page. Never indent the abstract. Restrict it to one paragraph. Numbers used in the abstract should be typed as digits rather than spelled out, unless they are used at the beginning of a sentence.
   2. For additional information, please see https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/656/1/
2. Main body
   1. Begins on page 3 with the introduction (although APA guidelines does not use the heading “Introduction”.
   2. Use additional headings as appropriate for the layout and format of the paper.
3. Reference List (minimum of 10 which are < 5 years old)
   1. Follow APA formatting for each citation, listing them alphabetically.
   2. Any referenced citations in the body of the paper should be paraphrased in your own

words, rather than direct quotations as much as possible. Be aware of plagiarism!

1. Appendices: including supporting documents such as your survey, any tables and figures

(referenced appropriately in the paper and properly cited in the appendix)

1. There should be a running head, correctly formatted.