Evaluating the Outcome & Impact of Two Evidence Based Public Health Nursing Education Projects

Despite the current interest around the process of evidence-based practice and research that shows better outcomes associated with this practice, only a small percentage of public health practitioners are consistently incorporating this process into their practice. This paper reports the impact of a collaborative effort of public health nursing faculty and health science librarians to further improve access to and evaluation of the evidenced base for public health nursing. This project employed statewide workshops and online tutorials to educate public health nurses in literature retrieval and evaluation. Analysis and discussion of both quantitative and qualitative evaluation data from two successful grant projects funded by the National Library of Medicine are presented. Evaluation revealed significant differences in outcomes and impact between the two projects; these differences may be a reflection of characteristics of attendees and the methodology of the offerings. To increase the likelihood of public health practitioners' use of evidence-based skills and to assure long-term retention, future workshops will 1) continue to incorporate hands-on computer training and 2) provide further education for developing research questions appropriate to practice and policy development.