How to write the assignment:
This assignment requires you to carry out a critical inquiry and synthesis of the literature in a structured manner. The structure suggested in these guidelines utilizes elements from the more traditional literature review process to help you achieve this.
Below are the suggested sections of the assignment although you may break it down under further headings if you wish. The marking criteria at the end of this handbook will also be useful in guiding your writing.
Introduction (about 500 words)
In this section you will be expected to give an overview of the topic that you have chosen and how it fits in to the overall scheme of health and social care provision. This provides context for the essay in terms of the broader social, political and health care environments and agendas and a justification in relation to your particular pathway of study.
Your choice of topic might be:
• Clinical
• Practice orientated
• Related to health or social care policy
• A professional issue
NB Other topics may be negotiated with your personal tutor/academic supervisor but must directly relate to your intended professional qualification and must relate to practice in the UK.
Ensure in this section that you clearly identify your topic area and make it specific enough to enable you to plan and carry out a focussed search. Constructing a specific search question to answer or a statement will help you to do this.
Review of published material related to your chosen topic (about 3500 words)
Start by giving a brief overview of your search strategy identifying your search terms and sources you used to generate your literature search outcomes.
In order to address the state of knowledge within your topic area you will need to identify and present the findings from a range of different sources of evidence as follows:
• Empirical (actual) research
• Policies and guidelines (national and local)
• Reviews, including systematic reviews
• Opinion papers
• Patient group information
All essays MUST include contemporary research, an appropriate amount of policy or guidance documents as well as appropriate literature from the above sources. You should not ignore any major policies, reviews or research in your area of interest.
The policy documents should be used to contextualize the discussion of what happens in practice now, what should happen in practice now and what should happen in practice in the future.
The other sources of evidence may inform the review of your topic throughout its different stages. Consideration should however be given to the quality of these sources as forms of evidence and whether they should be used to inform professional practice.
Note this does not mean a detailed critique of research articles. It means a consideration of the quality of the evidence which will utilise critiquing skills learned last year.
Discussion and conclusions (about 2000 words)
This is your opportunity to pull together the ideas and themes that have emerged from your review of different sources of evidence in your area of interest. Special consideration should be given at this stage as to how the different evidence either fits together or perhaps contradicts each other. At this stage it is also important to consider the quality of the evidence from the review.
The conclusion will be a paragraph or so about what ultimately you have found. This will then be followed by a brief discussion about what actually happens in practice now. This then leads into the need to suggest areas for further research or policy changes that appear to be required given what you have already said.
