Research Resources: Developing the Research Question, Part II

The research question should be identified as early as possible in the residency year.  Selection of an appropriate research question is one of the greatest challenges confronting pharmacy residents and their research advisors.  The residency year provides a relatively short period of time to conduct quality “research” and the execution of the project must be balanced with the training priorities of the pharmacy residency.  It is imperative that the resident and the advisor select an appropriately narrow research question that addresses an important practice issue.  For resident projects, the use of retrospective data is usually easier, given the limited time available for study completion.

In preparing to formulate the study idea, the resident and advisor can consider national health care priorities. National health care priorities are one potential source of study questions. The ASHP Health System Pharmacy 2015 Initiative goals and objectives provide guidance on priorities for the improvement of pharmacy practice in health systems.  The Core Measures and National Patient Safety Goals from The Joint Commission are also potential sources that can be used to develop practice-based research questions.  Applicants should also consider other ASHP policy documents and initiatives when selecting a research question. See ASHP’s Practice and Policy Resource Page for complete information on ASHP’s policy documents.

For an extensive discussion of his topic, see Dr. Earlene Lipowski’s article on developing great research questions.

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