The chapter also describes the characteristics of workable hypotheses and provides guidance for a critical evaluation of hypotheses appearing in research reports. Because the wording of hypotheses is often problematic to students, considerable attention is paid to the issue of alternative wordings. The following two studies are illustrative again of quantitative and qualitative approaches to posing research questions. The investigator was concerned with several aspects of the chart in terms of its communication potential to various hospital personnel. Cain proceeded to reflect on her own experiences and observations relative to these issues and reviewed the literature to find whether other researchers had these problems.
Physicians refer to nursing notes on the patients' charts less frequently than do other personnel.
The use of nursing notes by physicians is related to the location of the notes on the chart. Nurses perceive that nursing notes are referred to less frequently than they are in fact referred to. Nursing notes are more likely to be referred to by hospital personnel if the patient has been hospitalized for more than 5 days than if the patient has been hospitalized for 5 or fewer days. A preliminary search of the literature on dyspnea suggested that there was relatively little research on how people with a chronic pulmonary disease react to and cope with the sensation of dyspnea. Suggest changes, if appropriate, that would make them consistent.