Nurses are required to continue their education with the aim of making it high in their professional career. As far as research in this field is concerned, there are several strategies that can be followed. This write-up has some useful research topics for those aspiring to make it big in this field.
Did You Know?
Florence Nightingale, rightly called “The Lady with the Lamp”, pioneered Modern Nursing.
Nursing is one of the most critical and difficult branches of medical sciences. It can also be said that nursing is not just a science, it is an art of healing with the help of emotions. One of the most important aspects of nursing is easing a patient’s pain with the help of human touch. It is this ability of a nurse to feel and recognize the pain of patients that makes this vocation unique.
Choosing research topics in nursing can be a bit difficult. Your research paper topic and report has to be simple yet unique. There is a vast array of nursing research topics that you can choose from. It would be very impressive if you can select a topic that shows ways in which the conditions of the patients of the Third World countries or tribal areas can be improved with the help of proper nursing practices.
The below-mentioned nursing research topics are generic. You should select one genre and explore deeper. After you find a suitable topic, do a strong background research, review some literature, and then present a truly unique report or a research paper that will leave an impact.
Research Topics in the Field of Nursing
You may refer to the topics listed below and contemplate on what’s best for you.
- Illnesses Associated with Aging: How can Nurses Help?
- Dealing with Chronic Illnesses: What do Nurses Need to Know?
- Improving Women’s Health: Facing the Challenges
- Neonatal Nursing
- Pediatric Health and Illness Care
- Handling Emergency and Critical Care Patients: Strategies for Quick Response
- Abuse and Emotional Rehabilitation: Role of Nurses
- Dealing with Fears and Phobias: With the Help of Nurses
- Promoting Healthy Living by Preventing Illness: What can Nurses do?
- New Systems and Modernization: Need for Awareness Generation
- Nursing Practices Around the World: Commonalities and Differences
- Accredited and Famous Schools for Nursing
- Types of Nursing Careers: The Professional Pathway
- History of Nursing Science: Example: Case of Bergen-Belsen
- How the Role of Nurses has Changed? Past, Present, and Future
- Safety of Nurses: Has Anyone Addressed the Risks?
- Shortage of Nurses: Why the Gap is Created?
- Nursing Hierarchy: How to Climb the Ladder?
- Dealing with a Multigenerational Team at Work
- Nursing Ethics and Patient Safety
- How to Facilitate International Migration of Nurses?
- Nursing License: Renewal and Transfer
- How to Communicate One’s Economic Worth in Nursing?
- Role of Social Media in Nursing Education
- Difference between Nurses and Primary Care Providers
- Should Complementary or Alternative Therapies be Counted as Nursing?
- Boom of Ayurveda: What? Why? How?
Here are elaborations for some selected topics that will help ease your task.
The Nurses at Bergen-Belsen
This story is a masterpiece in the history of nursing. It is an unusual and untouched subject and can turn out to be a great research topic for any student of nursing. Bergen-Belsen was a concentration camp during the Second World War. About 60 to 70 thousand Jews, Poles, Russians, and POWs were held by the Nazis in this camp.
As the war ended, the food and medical supplies were cut off, and to make things worse, an epidemic of Typhus broke out within the camp. The condition was further worsened as a result of malnutrition and starvation in some cases. It was found that out of the 60,000 prisoners, almost 13,000 had died due to the inhumane conditions, and the rest were debilitated.
This story shows how a few doctors and nurses from the Allied side and Red Cross, nursed back to health, the prisoners of this camp.
You will find this story of courage and valor in many books, and if you wish to take up this topic for your research, then you can elaborate on the following points:
- Typhus and its outbreak
- Rehabilitation of the patients
- Provision of appropriate nutrition
- Psychological rehabilitation of patients
- A description of the entire process of rehabilitation and patient care
- Bringing the patients back to life
Ayurveda
Developed in the Indian Subcontinent, Ayurveda is an ancient medical science that is used to treat the ailments of the human body. It is gaining popularity because it uses natural methods that have no negative or side effects on the body.
You can take up Ayurveda as a research topic and elaborate on a few things like:
- Natural painkillers that have an almost instant effect
- Healing wounds with the help of Ayurvedic medication
- Sources of medication
- How can the nurses use these medications to help patients?
Phobias
There are many different phobias, which the patients tend to display. With the help of a list of all phobias, you can generate research topics. You may emphasize on the following:
- Psychological reasons behind the phobia
- Symptoms and identification
- How to provide an instant remedy to your patient?
- Available medication
Systems and Modernization
With the help of modern sciences, many advanced systems, such as computers and software (that aid the infrastructure of hospitals) have been created. You can prepare a very good set of research topics elaborating the uses and advantages of these systems. You may work on the following:
- Available systems
- New recommendations in the available systems
- Advantages of these systems
- How can the nurses use these systems?
Abuse and Trauma Nursing
Physical and mental infliction of trauma is of grave concern in the modern society. The biggest problem with abuse and trauma is that a deep unresolved wound is left on the heart of the victim. Proper rehabilitation and healing the patient both psychologically and physically are one of the toughest aspects of nursing. There are also cases of self-inflected injuries, which are even more difficult to deal with.
In order to write a research paper on this topic, you may take into consideration the following:
- Psychological aspect of trauma and abuse inflicted by another person
- Means of using psychological techniques for recovery
- Emotional rehabilitation
- Therapy for rehabilitation of confidence and bearing
- Therapy and solutions for long-term rehabilitation, cure for all fears and problems
In addition to the aforementioned topics, to come up with some really novel topics, you can just look around you (home, schools, community centers, teaching methods in a nursing school, etc.) and find out the problem areas. If the problem is really big enough that it requires a study, go ahead and take it up.
But before you finalize the topic, be realistic and keep in mind the feasibility in terms of:
- Time – See if you can finish it in the set deadline of your nursing school.
- Money – It is the most important variable that you need to be sure of. You don’t want to be stuck in the middle of nowhere due to lack of funds after half of the semester is over.
- Interest – Even if you have the time and money but lack interest in a particular topic, change the topic before it becomes too late. If you still take up the topic, you won’t be able to do justice to it.
You may also refer to online journals to check what are the areas in which research is currently going on.
There are countless areas and places within the field of medical sciences, which would provide you with ideas for nursing research topics, so that you can produce some really good research papers. In reality, in spite of the sound and highly progressive nature of medical sciences, there are a number of things that have still remained unexplored and unexplained.