ALIGNING THE DNP PROJECT PAPER WITH AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF COLLEGES OF NURSING ESSENTIALS
ALIGNING THE DNP PROJECT PAPER WITH AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF COLLEGES OF NURSING ESSENTIALS
The DNP project paper must be aligned with the AACN (2006) essentials for doctoral education. The DNP essentials outline eight foundational curricular elements that address the cost and complexity of healthcare systems, the expanding volume of new best practices, the political and social forces that drive policy, and the evolving models of healthcare economics. To fully report the impact of a DNP project, a student’s scholarly paper must encompass the following eight AACN essentials:
- Scientific Underpinnings of Practice. Effective DNP scholarly papers demonstrate the integration of biophysical, psychosocial, and analytical sciences that underpin the DNP project. Sound theory and science-based concepts are required to enhance healthcare delivery and improve health outcomes. For example, Social Network Theory (Kadushen, 2012) may be used in a DNP project to guide an intervention that fosters positive work relationships in an organization and subsequently used in the project paper to explain how the student implemented the Social Network Theory as an intervention. Integrating discussion of scientific underpinnings into the scholarly paper helps students underscore their project’s credibility with consumers, healthcare providers, and the scientific community.
- Organizational and Systems Leadership for Quality. DNP leaders assimilate nursing science and practice to address the complex healthcare needs of society (AACN, 2006). DNP students, as organizational and/or systems leaders, must describe in their project papers the factors that promote the use of scientific innovations to their maximum extent and effectiveness (National Implementation Research Network, 2019). Ways in which DNP students describe organizational and systems leadership include development of clinical practice guidelines, evidence-based interventions, and evaluating practice outcomes.
- Clinical Scholarship and Analytical Methods for Evidence-Based Practice: Students must address essential number three in the project paper to demonstrate the skills that facilitate systems and organization-wide changes. An important aspect of a scholarly project paper consists of describing how students assured accountability for quality care delivery and identified potential ethical dilemmas associated with healthcare delivery. For example, if the DNP project is an intervention to prevent patient falls in a pediatric hospital, a student will want to include a root cause analysis (i.e., process of uncovering causes of problems) of falls for pediatric patients in the project facility as part of the paper.
- Information Systems/Technology and Patient Care Technology for the Improvement and Transformation of Health Care: Because technology is central to efficient, safe, and patient-centered care, DNP students must address how they used information and technology to support their project practice changes. Describing the technology used to facilitate healthcare delivery demonstrates a student’s ability to foster technological innovation, evaluate the utility of consumer information, and identify potential legal and ethical issues associated with technology and information.
- Health Care Policy for Advocacy in Health Care: Within the context of the scholarly paper, students must identify problems, associated with their topics, that are impacted by current policy. Evaluating a hospice organization’s policies for managing acute pain and comparing them with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ recommendations for pain management is an example of policy evaluation. Students must demonstrate a capacity for interpreting and analyzing current healthcare policies to advance the goals of equitable healthcare and social justice that are central to DNP project topics.
- Interprofessional Collaboration for Improving Patient and Population Health Outcomes: Given the multi-professional composition of healthcare systems, effective DNP projects require interprofessional collaboration (IPC). Janotha and Tamari (2017) provide an IPC exemplar in their article about care of patients with oral squamous cell carcinoma. A description of how DNP students help lead interprofessional teams using communication, collaborative skills, and evaluation is an essential component of a project paper.
- Clinical Prevention and Population Health for Improving the Nation’s Health: To understand the origin of healthcare problems, wise DNP students use epidemiological, biostatistical, occupational, and environmental data to inform their project’s background and methodology. In their scholarly project papers, students must address how these data impact psychosocial and cultural influences of population-based care. For example, if the DNP project is focused on “interventions to reduce sharps related injuries,” students will need micro and macro occupational and environmental data to form a holistic context for the project.
- Advanced Nursing Practice: Because DNP students use expert, advanced nursing knowledge in specialized areas of healthcare, the project paper must reflect a student’s ability to conduct comprehensive needs assessments, mentor other nurses in the delivery of optimal care, and guide patients through complex life transitions. Advanced practice nurse expertise empowers DNP students to promote safety and quality of care, reduce healthcare disparities, and lead interprofessional teams to improve healthcare outcomes, which are key components that must be discussed in the DNP project paper.
The critical doctoral-level skills gained through use of the AACN DNP essentials influence healthcare outcomes for patients and populations and therefore must be emphasized in the DNP project paper. Throughout this book, readers will find indicators of where to highlight the eight AACN essentials in the project paper.
IDENTIFYING A PRACTICE APPLICATION PROJECT
The success of a well-crafted scholarly project paper is predicated, in part, on the topic students select for their practice projects. Initially, when thinking about a DNP project topic, students may not consider how the topic will influence the process of crafting and writing a scholarly project paper. Given the complexity of DNP projects and subsequent papers, when selecting a topic, it is worth contemplating how a topic will affect the forthcoming writing process.
There is no gold standard tool for helping DNP students select the best topic for their projects and ensuing papers. Nevertheless, it is helpful for students to remember when considering potential topics that the ultimate written product must be relevant and impactful.
A relevant DNP topic is significant and indicative of having a demonstrable bearing on healthcare and/or healthcare systems.
For example, “Should electronic scooter use be allowed in state parks?” may be an interesting topic, but it has limited significance and little bearing on healthcare. However, “What are the most important safety instructions for adolescents who use electronic scooters?” has major healthcare significance and policy implications. Topic relevance establishes that a DNP project and paper have the potential to be useful. The topic should have scientific, social, and practical relevance to patients, healthcare providers, healthcare organizations, and society. Scientific relevance means the project will help close the gap between current science and practical application to patient care (Institute of Medicine, 2001). Importantly, the topic must have relevance to the student to help sustain motivation and interest. Because DNP projects tend to address local, clinical problems, the topic must be relevant to the entity where the project’s problem is occurring (e.g., rural long-term care facility).
The most impactful DNP projects change practice and policy. Impactful DNP projects influence, in enduring ways, how people work and live. DNP projects are, by design, relevant to the National Academy of Sciences’ (2005) recommendation to prepare clinical doctorate experts in nursing, and therefore impact how healthcare organizations and systems operate and subsequently influence society. In considering a DNP Project topic, students must give serious thought to the relationships among a project’s potential success, impact, and sustainability. How the DNP project impacts a select geography (e.g., environmental concerns in Flint, Michigan), culture (e.g., healthcare and the Navajo philosophy), timeframe (e.g., highest incidence of contagious disease over past 10 years), discipline (e.g., cost-effectiveness of medical homes), and/or population group (e.g., effects of urban air pollution on people over 65) must be identified and described convincingly in the project paper.
