Using Implementation Science in Nursing Research

Abstract

Objectives: Clinical research continues to build knowledge that can potentially improve clinical and health service outcomes; however, integrating evidence into routine care is challenging, resulting in a knowledge practice gap. The field of implementation science is a resource available for nurses to translate evidence into their practice. This article aims to provide nurses with an overview of implementation science, illustrate its value integrating evidence into practice, and show how it can be applied with high rigor in nursing research practice.

Data sources: A narrative synthesis of the implementation science literature was conducted. A series of case studies were purposively selected to demonstrate the application of commonly used implementation theories, models, and frameworks across health care settings relevant to nursing. These case studies demonstrate how the theoretical framework was applied and how the outcomes of the work reduced the knowledge practice gap.

Conclusion: Implementation science theoretical approaches have been used by nurses and multidisciplinary teams to better understand the gap between knowledge and practice for better informed implementation. These can be used to understand the processes involved, identify the determinants at play, and undertake an effective evaluation.

Implications for nursing practice: By using implementation science research practice, nurses can also build a strong foundation of evidence about nursing clinical practice. As an approach, implementation science is practical and can optimize the valuable nursing resource.

Keywords: Clinical practice; Clinical research; Implementation science; Knowledge translation; Nursing.