Commentary on: del Pozo Cruz B, Ahmadi MN, Lee IM, Stamatakis E. Prospective Associations of Daily Step Counts and Intensity With Cancer and Cardiovascular Disease Incidence and Mortality and All-Cause Mortality. JAMA Intern Med. 2022 Nov 1;182(11):1139-1148. doi: 10.1001/jamainternmed.2022.4000.
Encouraging daily steps and increasing the daily time with high cadence steps may be important means to prevent morbidity and prolong lifespan. Assessment of daily steps over a longer period may further elucidate the shape of the dose–response relationship and better quantify the benefits of increasing daily step counts.
Physical activity is widely recommended due to the extensive evidence supporting its numerous health benefits, including lower risks of morbidity and mortality. While current physical activity guidelines quantify their recommendations in terms of minutes of physical activity, step count has emerged as another popular metric for quantifying physical activity. However,...
Since 2019, the nursing profession has been frequently represented in mainstream media in the UK through the lenses of the COVID-19 pandemic and more recently, industrial action. In 2020, during COVID, we saw the nursing profession praised, with weekly neighbourhood applause and thanks to the National Health Service (NHS) staff schemes. In 2023, when, for the first time in history nurses voted to strike (fair pay for nursing), nurses again received media attention. Conversely, the media chose to report how striking nurses (and other health professional staff) contributed to long waiting lists in the NHS and unhelpfully, demonstrated how 64% of poll voters (n=7955) did not think nurses should have a better pay deal.
Researchers often refer to the type of ‘reasoning’ that they have used to support their analysis and reach conclusions within their study. For example, Krick and colleagues completed a study that supported the development of an outcome framework for measuring the effectiveness of digital nursing technologies.
This article will explore inductive and deductive reasoning and their place in nursing research. We will also explore a third approach to reasoning—abductive reasoning—which is arguably less well-known than induction and deduction, but just as prevalent and important in nursing practice and nursing research.
Induction, or inductive reasoning, involves the identification of cues and the collection of data to develop general...
The long-awaited NHS England workforce plan
The first comprehensive workforce plan for the NHS, putting staffing on a sustainable footing and improving patient care. It focuses on retaining existing talent and making the best use of new technology alongside the biggest recruitment drive in health service history.
This is a laudable aim, but can this ambitious plan really deliver the actions needed to transform the long-term future of this critical workforce?
Workforce planning is crucial to the success of the National Health Service (NHS) and has been notable by its absence in recent decades. The publication of this plan could be seen as a step in the right direction. Workforce planning requires
Data analysis of the current workforce and...
Phenomenography is a method of exploring the phenomenon of interest by examining how a group of individuals experience said phenomenon, uncovering the similarities and differences of this shared experience. The purpose of this paper is to outline the case for phenomenography as a research method ideally suited to explore the complex problems encountered by nurses and midwives within their everyday practice.
Phenomenography emerged in the mid-1970s from the landmark study by Marton and Saljo
Commentary on: Neely SR, Eldredge C, Ersing R, Remington C. Vaccine Hesitancy and Exposure to Misinformation: a Survey Analysis. J Gen Intern Med. 2022 Jan;371,:179-187. doi: 10.1007/s11606-021-07171-z. Epub 2021 Oct 20.
Implementing strategic trustworthy communication that targets misinformation themes counters negative information about vaccines and helps achieve community support for vaccination programmes. Amplifying the presence of health professionals on social media and collaborating with political thought leaders may help to anticipate, identify and offset health-related misinformation.
Since the emergence of the SARS-CoV-2 in late 2019, there has been an unprecedented global change. Each country took actions to respond to the outbreak including guidance development, surveillance and epidemiology, testing, providing emergency supplies and rapid vaccine development. During this time, governments struggled to keep up with misinformation, conspiracy theories, social media rumours and uncertainty.