DDHA 9500 Week 5 Peer Critique Example

Where a Classmate's Problem and Purpose Stop Matching: A Peer Critique of a Draft on First-Year Nurse Turnover, With Edits Written Out

Student Name

Walden University

DDHA 9500: DHA Project Prospectus

Instructor Name

Month Day, Year

Where a Classmate's Problem and Purpose Stop Matching: A Peer Critique of a Draft on First-Year Nurse Turnover, With Edits Written Out

The Two Sentences Under Review

Problem sentence, as drafted by my classmate Joanna: "At a 220-bed community hospital, newly hired registered nurses leave within their first year at a rate that strains unit staffing and increases agency spending, and national data show that first-year turnover remains high."

Purpose sentence, as drafted: "The purpose of this qualitative study is to explore how nurse managers across the health system perceive the effectiveness of the nurse residency program in improving patient satisfaction."

The problem is clear and worth studying. The purpose answers a different one. The defects below are listed by type rather than by order in the draft, and each comes with the words that show it and a proposed edit.

Defect 1: The Population Changes

The problem concerns "newly hired registered nurses" who "leave within their first year." The purpose concerns "nurse managers." Managers may have useful views, but they are not the people whose departure is the problem, and they may not know why nurses left. A reader moving from the first sentence to the second would expect to hear from new nurses or about them.

Proposed edit: replace "nurse managers" with "registered nurses who left the hospital within their first year of employment."

Defect 2: The Setting Widens

The problem is located at "a 220-bed community hospital." The purpose reaches "across the health system." The draft does not say whether turnover is high at the other hospitals, so the purpose extends the study to settings the problem never described.

Proposed edit: replace "across the health system" with "at a 220-bed community hospital."

Defect 3: An Outcome Appears From Nowhere

The problem names two consequences, strained staffing and agency spending. The purpose introduces a third, "patient satisfaction," which the problem never mentions. An outcome that enters only in the purpose suggests the study has drifted toward a different question.

Proposed edit: remove "in improving patient satisfaction."

Defect 4: The Verb Promises More Than the Approach Can Produce

"Perceive the effectiveness of the nurse residency program" asks a qualitative study to judge effectiveness, which requires comparing outcomes, for example retention among nurses who completed the residency and those who did not. Perceptions of effectiveness can be explored, but the sentence reads as though the study will establish whether the program works. Creswell and Creswell (2018) describe qualitative purpose statements as exploring a central phenomenon with participants at a site, and "effectiveness" is an evaluative judgment rather than a phenomenon.

Proposed edit: replace "perceive the effectiveness of the nurse residency program" with "describe the reasons for their departure, including their experience of the nurse residency program."

The Smaller of the Two Alternatives

There are two ways to make the sentences match. Joanna could rewrite the problem to fit the purpose, making the problem about managers' views of the residency program across the system. Or she could rewrite the purpose to fit the problem. I recommend the second, because the problem statement is the stronger sentence and already has evidence behind it, and because rewriting the purpose changes one sentence rather than the foundation of the project.

Combining the four edits, the revised purpose would read: "The purpose of this qualitative study is to explore how registered nurses who left a 220-bed community hospital within their first year of employment describe the reasons for their departure, including their experience of the nurse residency program."

One Further Note

The problem's evidence, "national data show that first-year turnover remains high," would be stronger with a figure and a source. Kovner et al. (2014) showed that reported turnover rates vary widely depending on how turnover is defined and measured, so the draft should state which definition the hospital uses, for example voluntary separations within twelve months of hire, before comparing it with any national figure. Palinkas et al. (2015) may also help when the sampling section is written, since reaching nurses who have already left will require purposeful recruitment.

References

Creswell, J. W., & Creswell, J. D. (2018). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches (5th ed.). SAGE.

Kovner, C. T., Brewer, C. S., Fatehi, F., & Jun, J. (2014). What does nurse turnover rate mean and what is the rate? Policy, Politics, & Nursing Practice, 15(3-4), 64-71. https://doi.org/10.1177/1527154414547953

Palinkas, L. A., Horwitz, S. M., Green, C. A., Wisdom, J. P., Duan, N., & Hoagwood, K. (2015). Purposeful sampling for qualitative data collection and analysis in mixed method implementation research. Administration and Policy in Mental Health and Mental Health Services Research, 42(5), 533-544. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10488-013-0528-y