A PICO question is a consistent formula for developing answerable researchable questions. The question templates entail P for the population, I for the intervention in mind, C for the comparison group and lastly and O for the outcome. The article will describe the use of online resources in gathering materials for the PICO question: Do dietary modifications for hypertensive patients result in delayed disease progression as compared to pharmacological interventions alone?
Two databases were selected for this study, and they included PubMed and CINAHL. The first database used was PubMed. The words “diet modification compared to drug intervention in hypertensive patients” were used to perform the search in the PubMed database. Approximately 65 findings were returned. The first filter applied to narrow the results was by the publication date. Selecting 5-year-old publications narrowed the results to just 7. Newer publications represent current information and revisions hence more information on an intervention. The next step was only to show results whose abstract was accessible. The results remained at 7. The last step was deciding on the most appropriate study and then looking for similar publications based on that particular single study.
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From the seven results, three relevant findings were selected as suitable for the study. The first one was by Kapil et al. (2015) which discussed the benefits of dietary nitrate in sustained lowering in blood pressure. The next study was by Gunawardhana et al. (2017) which assessed the effects of Febuxostat in blood pressure subjects with hyperuricemia and hypertension. The last of the three relevant findings was by Pilz et al. (2015) which assessed the effects of vitamin D on blood pressure and cardiovascular risk factors. All these studies were selected on the merits of their publication year and how well they had articulated their ideas to the PICO question.
The next database used was the CINAHL. The same search phrase was used, and I got 36 hits from the site. The articles in CINAHL are rated by using a complicated search algorithm. For instance, it suggests words that will provide better results and then displays possible alternate terms to the searched words. This ranking system is particularly useful to researchers since the broad nature of it ensures that it captures all relevant information concerning the topic of interest. The left side filter is also helpful as it can tune the results to more exceptional levels such as the source types, which are not there in the PubMed database.
From the above information, a researcher can incorporate the following steps to narrow down the search information. Firstly, from a PICO question, derive the critical concept that you are aiming at understanding from a study. With this in mind, develop keywords that are helpful in the search. Full phrases do not necessarily provide specific results. Sort the results obtained by time, availability of the material, i.e., either full text or abstract, and finally read through the abstracts of the topics of interest to identify their usefulness.
Narrowing a search is important as it saves time and ensures the data obtained is relevant. From the two sites, I prefer CINAHL since the hits were fewer and it provided more exceptional tuning details that were lacking in the PubMed database. A database is used to store data that can be searched or not searched while a search engine is responsible for handling the user’s inputs to produce results from a database. Therefore, a database will return numerous results, most of which will not be relevant, while a search engine will narrow down the search and only display a few specific results, most of which are relevant.
Due to the specific nature of the search engine, I prefer it to the database as it displays fewer particular results when compared to a database. It is therefore quick, efficient and effective in obtaining data for research.
References
Gunawardhana, L., McLean, L., Punzi, H. A., Hunt, B., Palmer, R. N., Whelton, A., & Feig, D. I. (2017). Effect of Febuxostat on Ambulatory Blood Pressure in Subjects with Hyperuricemia and Hypertension: A Phase 2 Randomized Placebo-Controlled Study. Journal of the American Heart Association , 6 (11), e006683.
Kapil, V., Khambata, R. S., Robertson, A., Caulfield, M. J., & Ahluwalia, A. (2015). Dietary nitrate provides sustained blood pressure lowering in hypertensive patients: a randomized, phase 2, double-blind, placebo-controlled study. Hypertension , 65 (2), 320- 327.
Pilz, S., Gaksch, M., Kienreich, K., Grübler, M., Verheyen, N., Fahrleitner-Pammer, A., ... & Schwetz, V. (2015). Effects of vitamin D on blood pressure and cardiovascular risk factors: a randomized controlled trial. Hypertension , 65 (6), 1195-1201.
