Whose evidence? Agenda setting in multi-professional research: observations from a case study

This paper presents Ž ndings from a study that investigated the relationship between research and practice on a Nursing Development Unit (NDU) in a hospital in the UK. The over-arching aim of the NDU was to promote individualised patient care. This requires the experiences and life goals of the patient, including the patient’s and family construction of risk, to inform the care planning process. Two projects, undertaken by nurses on the ward, one on inpatient self-medication and the other on the management of falls, are analysed as case studies in order to address the questions: (1) How do nurses develop and research patient-centred care? (2) What are the implications of their choice of methodology in relation to their stated aims of individualising care? The paper demonstrates how conventions about research methodology and outcomes dominated the nurses’ interpretation of research, the hospital research agenda and the literature on the research topics. These conventions shaped the construction of risk and safety within the hospital setting compromising practice developments designed to support the implementation of individualised care processes.