With words by Abner Kooner, Lillian Li and Gabriella Collins
Promoting positive health outcomes
Within the field of Nursing, researchers and practitioners are looking for better ways to incorporate patients’ views and perspectives, in order to optimize the delivery of health care.
Abner Kooner, a research assistant at TWU, sees this development as particularly meaningful.
“This is especially exciting for the nursing profession as it is inherently client-centred and actively implements evidence-informed best practices to promote positive health outcomes."
Patient-centred measures have significant clinical value and enable healthcare professionals to provide quality care as relevant to the patient.
Under the supervision of Dr. Angela Wolff, Abner and fellow TWU research assistants Lillian Li and Gabriella Collins are advancing research into patient-centred measures (PCMs), assessments tools that help capture the patient's voice and perspective.
“This is especially exciting for the nursing profession as it is inherently client-centred and actively implements evidence-informed best practices to promote positive health outcomes."
Supported by TWU undergraduate research awards
Abner, Lillian, and Gabriella are among the recipients of 2022 TWU undergraduate research awards, a program to recognize high-calibre students and support them to fully pursue their potential as researchers and scholars.
Winners of TWU undergraduate research awards gain experience in conducting research under the guidance of a faculty-mentor while pursuing projects relevant to the students' areas of interest and specialization.
This year, Abner and his colleagues worked with Dr. Wolff on the project titled, “Healthcare provider characteristics that influence the implementation of individual-level patient-centred outcome measure (PROM) and patient-reported experience measure (PREM) data across practice settings.”
Their project expands upon Dr. Wolff’s ongoing research by advancing the literature pertaining to patient centred measures (PCMs), including patient-reported outcome measures or PROMs (assessment tools that illuminate health-related outcomes as relevant to patients, given their current health status) and patient-reported experience measures or PREMs (more subjective assessment tools that consider the individual’s healthcare or illness experience).
The research project includes an extensive systematic review, and primarily aims to create a resource guide for healthcare providers incorporating patient-reported data into their practice (see https://www.healthyqol.com/resource-guide).
As part of their work, Abner and the research team conducted a scoping review to further the discourse on PCMs. Building upon Dr. Wolff’s systematic review, this scoping review seeks to consolidate existing evidence, identify knowledge gaps, and clarify numerous key concepts pertaining to PROMs and PREMs research.
About the research team
Fourth-year nursing students Abner Kooner, Lillian Li, and Gabriella Collins are undergraduate research assistants working with Dr. Angela Wolff.
With his intrinsic desire to engage with research, Abner seeks to nurture his spirit of inquiry by deepening his research knowledgebase. Through Dr. Wolff’s mentorship, Abner has gained invaluable opportunities to grow his theoretical research knowledge and engage in practical research work. For example, Abner’s work has led him to use qualitative data analysis software (i.e., NVivo), learn from international researchers at the UK National Patient Reported Outcome Measurement Annual Research Conference and learn to synthesize research evidence and write for publication.
This past summer, Lillian joined Dr. Wolff for a second summer of learning, exploring, asking questions, and trying to answer them. Through this experience, Lillian was able to see evidence informed practice come to life: turning theories and academic research into practical tools, empowering healthcare providers to fulfill their commitment of client-centred care. As an aspiring healthcare provider and practitioner, Lillian believes that it is every nurse’s professional and ethical responsibility to contribute to research, whether that be as an academic or clinician. Lillian hopes to encourage her peers to be involved and advocate for a more inclusive environment for nursing research in healthcare.
Gabriella has enjoyed being a research assistant for the past two summers and plans to continue her research journey not only as a research assistant, but also by applying for the Master of Science in Nursing degree at TWU. Gabriella has most enjoyed seeing the "big picture" of a research project come together as the research team collaborates to support one another each step of the way. She considers it a privilege to be coached by Dr. Wolff and to share the experience with two wonderful fellow nursing student colleagues.
Dr. Wolff has enjoyed the experience of working with a stellar group of undergraduate students over the past two summers. This has provided an opportunity to build research capacity for the new generation of nurses, reaching far beyond this project. She looks forward to following these students' career paths.
This student research and mentorship program is supported by funding from the TWU Office of Research, Undergraduate Student Research Awards.
Pictured from left to right: Dr. Angela Wolff (Principal Investigator), Lillian Li (Undergraduate Student Research Assistant), Gabriella Collins (Undergraduate Student Research Assistant), and Abner Kooner (Undergraduate Student Research Assistant).
About TWU's School of Nursing
Caring for the health and well-being of individuals, families, and communities is both motivating and rewarding. We give you the knowledge and skills necessary for a nursing career in hospitals and community-based settings and the practical experience required to be highly sought after when you graduate. Learn more at TWU's School of Nursing.
About Trinity Western University
Founded in 1962, Trinity Western University is Canada’s premier global Christian liberal arts university. We are dedicated to equipping students to discover meaningful connections between career, life, and the needs of the world. Drawing upon the riches of the Christian tradition, seeking to unite faith and reason through teaching and scholarship, Trinity Western University is a degree-granting research institution offering liberal arts and sciences as well as professional schools in business, nursing, education, human kinetics, graduate studies, and arts, media, and culture. It has four locations in Canada: Langley, Richmond-Lansdowne, Richmond-Minoru, and Ottawa. Learn more at www.twu.ca or follow us on Twitter @TrinityWestern, on Facebook and LinkedIn.
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