Barriers in Translating Research into Practice

Hospital readmission within the first 30 days post discharge is extremely disruptive
and poses a huge economic burden to the healthcare system. In addition, readmission also
puts patients at risk of more complications and hospital-acquired infections. Recently, a
program to reduce the rate of hospital readmission was implemented at the Summerfield
Acute Care Hospital. The main aim was to reduce the 30-day readmission rate for patients
with acute myocardial infarction by 30%. According to Rymer et al. (2019) , the national
average for patients readmitted after an acute myocardial infarction stands between 10-
20%. The goal with the current initiative is to bring MI 30-day post op readmission to 6%
in a period of 6 months. Rymer et al. (2019) also noted that readmission rates reflect
various aspects of care including patient follow-up, discharge assessment, and care
coordination. Thus, reducing hospital readmission rates from the optimal 20% to 6% would
be beneficial to a hospital, whereby the rate is representative of quality assurance to
patients.
Despite the well laid-out goals towards reducing readmission rates, some common
barriers include lack of effective post-discharge communication, adherence to medical
solutions, and ongoing patient wellness education. In this case, lack of effective post-
discharge communication means that patients do not have sufficient support for their
recovery transition. To overcome this barrier, hospitals need to ensure that patients have
access to recovery-related forums where they can ask questions as well as find essential
educational resources.
Some of the most common factors that hinder translation of evidence-based research
into practice include the complex nature of healthcare systems, incapacity to debunk complex
statistics and lack of organizational support to implement changes (Tappen et al., 2017) . For
example, while researchers can gain access to resources to fund research, the availability of

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such kind of resources for system-wide adoption is often lacking. Besides, the economic
burden of in healthcare is subject to policy cuts in many settings, and collaboration with
insurers for patients to gain access to researched drugs is often frustrating at the clinical level.
Therefore, real-world effects of financial aid to promote adherence to novel drugs remains a
major challenge. Moreover, despite the knowledge that poor health outcomes are linked to
poor care delivery and execution rather than insufficient knowledge, the efforts to debunk
complex statistics associated with translational research are inefficient.
According to Curtis et al. (2017) , lack of infrastructure support means that registered
nurses, particularly APRNs, do not have the capacity to assess or implement new frameworks
of care delivery. Although there has been expansive adoption of technology in the clinical
settings, a good number of technology solutions are only implemented with respect to
consolidating patient information rather than clinical research. In instances where EHR has
been integrated with other information systems, clinicians and nurses still report underuse,
which is linked to other factors including lack of effective collaboration between
departments, increased workload, and lack of adequate training and education.
Different barriers at the individual, organizational, and unit levels affect the
understanding, evaluation, and interpretation of evidence by clinicians. For instance, nurses
might lack the knowledge required for research appraisal, which in turn limits the
implementation of knowledge in actual practice. Numerous surveys on the topic also indicate
that managers are not entirely supportive, and this might lead to different attitudes towards
implementing research in healthcare.

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References

Curtis, K., Fry, M., Shaban, R. Z., & Considine, J. (2017). Translating research findings to
clinical nursing practice. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 26(5–6), 862–872.
https://doi.org/10.1111/jocn.13586
Rymer, J. A., Chen, A. Y., Thomas, L., Fonarow, G. C., Peterson, E. D., & Wang, T. Y.
(2019). Readmissions After Acute Myocardial Infarction: How Often Do Patients
Return to the Discharging Hospital? Journal of the American Heart Association,
8(19), e012059. https://doi.org/10.1161/JAHA.119.012059
Tappen, R. M., Wolf, D. G., Rahemi, Z., Engstrom, G., Rojido, C., Shutes, J. M., &
Ouslander, J. G. (2017). Barriers and Facilitators to Implementing a Change Initiative
in Long-Term Care Utilizing the INTERACT TM Quality Improvement Program. The
Health Care Manager, 36(3), 219–230.
https://doi.org/10.1097/HCM.0000000000000168