The quality of nursing services provided to the future mothers depends not only on the qualification of midwives, though the latter issue also matters significantly, but also on the efficacy of information transfer from midwives to patients and vice versa. More importantly, the significance of establishing an efficient feedback system between midwives and the family members, whom the patient is related, is also essential to the efficacy of the intervention and the overall state of the pregnant woman’s health, not to mention the process of birth and the following recovery of the mother and the infant (Stewart, Sidebotham & Davis 2014). Herein the necessity to research the tools for enhancing the communication process in general and the feedback system in particular among midwives, patients, and their family members lies. Because of the need to provide a thorough overview of the existing communication tools, as well as develop an elaborate strategy for assessing the method chosen, the necessity to deploy the mixed study approach and integrate a qualitative and a quantitative method into the research emerges. Thus, the identification of the most efficient tools for communication in the nursing setting can be carried out.
The qualitative research design, which will serve as the basis for the study, will help gather the basic information concerning the principles of communication among midwives, as well as the process of retrieving information from patients and providing instructions to the latter and their families in the present-day nursing environment. While the research in question will only provide general information, it is essential to carry out the study in question in order to learn the key problems, which midwives experience in the course of communication with patients, as well as assess the significance of inviting family members for support of the pregnant woman. Indeed, according to recent studies, the process of retrieving feedback from patients is the key cause of concern for most nurses:
It seems reasonable to assume that a lack of education and accompanying uneasiness among clinical nurses in discussing palliative care with patients and their families may negatively impact the transition from curative-based care to hospice care. (Moir et al. 2015).
While the significance of family support cannot be considered underrated in the modern nursing setting, in most cases, family members lack the information on treating the pregnant woman properly and responding to her needs in a timely and efficient manner as possible. In other words, the lack of awareness among the family members is quite drastic and may have deplorable effects on the state of the pregnant woman’s health. Hence, an extensive analysis of the theory of communication between midwives, patients, and family members is required along with a vast study of the gaps in the literature. To analyze the issue properly, one will have to consult the latest articles on the subject matter, which have been published in peer-reviewed journals, and collect the data regarding not only the tools that have been used consistently over the past decade but also the ones that have emerged comparatively recently and are still in the process of designing and testing. The data acquired in the process of the study will be analyzed in accordance with the help of the grounded theory approach. The specified tool has been chosen due to the specifics of the study; to address the research question, one will have to develop a new theory of communication between midwives, pregnant women (i.e., patients), and the family members of the latter. Therefore, the concept of the grounded theory can be adopted as the key tool for the data analysis and the further design of the solution for the problem in question (Connelly 2013).
The quantitative method, which is going to be deployed for assessing the current state of communication efficacy among midwives, as well as the process of communication between nurses, patients, and their family members, will presuppose the use of surveys. It is suggested that three types of surveys (i.e., for nurses, patients, and the latter’s family members) should be designed so that the significance of establishing a solid connection between the target groups should be proven. The surveys in question will incorporate several types of questions, each designated for assessing a specific aspect of midwives’ work. For instance, the quality of the services, which midwives provide in response to the patients’ complaints, will be evaluated with the help of ten Likert-scale questions. To answer the questions designed with the help of the Likert scale, the respondents will have to evaluate the quality of the aspect of a certain service on a scale from one to seven. The choice of the evaluation scale was deliberate; the seven options provided for the respondents are not many enough to confuse them but are sufficient for evaluating the quality of the service rather precisely (Alimoradi et al. 2013).
Apart from the Likert scale approach, the questionnaire will include multiple-choice questions, which will narrow the study down to an embraceable amount of variables. The multiple-choice questions will address the issue of communication tools that midwives and patients prefer or typically resort to once they need to transfer essential information arises. It should be borne in mind, though, that the multiple-choice questions cannot possibly include all methods and tools that midwives, patients, and their family members may use, nor can they incorporate every single factor that impedes or enhances the communication process. Therefore, one of the options suggested in the multiple-choice questions will have to suggest that the respondents should fill in the blank with their answers if none of the suggested ones are close to the truth. Ten multiple-choice questions will be incorporated into the survey. Finally, the integration of general questions will help learn additional information concerning the information transfer and the problems that impede data delivery from one party involved to the other. General questions restrict the respondents to specific topics, at the same time allowing them to express themselves clearly.
The second part of the research, i.e., the quantitative study, will incorporate the data that has to be analyzed with the help of the Pearson Correlation tool; specifically, the correlation between the key variables, i.e., the quality of the services provided, the integration of technology in the process of communication, the invitation of family members for assistance and the provision of detailed instructions to the family members, will be identified. According to the existing studies, the tool in question will help identify the correlation between the key variables with high precision and, therefore, facilitate a detailed study of the subject matter with the following identification of the hypotheses’ veracity: “Sometimes, we are interested in quantifying the strength and direction of a presumed relationship between two variables. In these cases, we can use a measure of an association known as a correlation to determine the characteristics of this relationship” (Prion & Hareling 2014). Consequently, the adoption of the Pearson Correlation approach to the data analysis process will be imperative to process the information and identify the key problems in the present-day approach.
Since the research in question is aimed at both defining the tool that will allow for a more efficient communication process among midwives, as well as between midwives, patients, and their families, and the need to measure the success of the tool employed in the study, the necessity to incorporate the qualitative and the quantitative approaches emerge. Hence, a mixed method of research is desirable for evaluating the efficacy of the communication and information management approaches selected for the improvement in the outcomes of midwives’ efforts. Consequently, it will be required to integrate two separate approaches to data analysis. Specifically, general research, which will presuppose an evaluation of the existing methods of communication among midwives and patients, and a survey among the target audience (i.e., midwives and pregnant women) should be utilized as the basic tools for information retrieval. Once adopting the approaches that will allow for maximum objectivity of the information and, therefore, high rates of results veracity, the proof for the significance of communication between the staff and the patients and their family members will be provided and the location of the means to promote better communication between the above-mentioned parties will become possible.
Reference
Alimoradi, Z, Taghisadeh, Z, Rezaypour, A & Mehran, A 2013, ‘Evaluation of midwives’ communication skills,’ African Journal of Midwifery and Women’s Health, vol. 7, no. 1, pp. 19–24.
Connelly, L 2013, ‘Grounded theory,’ Medsurg Nursing: Official Journal of the Academy of Medical-Surgical Nurses, vol. 22, no. 2, pp. 124–127.
Moir, C, Roberts, R, Martz, K, Perry, J & Tivis, L J 2015, ‘Communicating with patients and their families about palliative and end-of-life care: comfort and educational needs of nurses,’ International Journal of Palliative Nursing, vol. 21, no. 3, pp. 109–112.
Prion, S & Hareling, K A 2014, ‘Making sense of methods and measurement: Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient,’ Clinical Simulation in Nursing, vol. 10, no. 11, pp. 587–588.
Stewart, S, Sidebotham, M & Davis, D. 2014, ‘International networking: connecting midwives through social media,’ International Nursing Review, vol. 59, no. 3, pp. 431–434.