Ace the ANCC Exam 2025 – Ignite Your Nursing Superpowers!

The evidence-based practice approach involves utilizing the best available research evidence, clinical expertise, and patient values to make informed decisions regarding healthcare. In the context of starting a new antihypertensive drug therapy, reviewing the confidence intervals of related research is essential.

Confidence intervals provide a statistical range that is likely to contain the true effect of the treatment in the population being studied. By examining these intervals, healthcare professionals can understand the effectiveness and reliability of the antihypertensive medication based on existing clinical trials and studies. This analysis helps in assessing the generalizability of the research findings to the patient population and informs the decision-making process for selecting the most appropriate therapy. Doing so exemplifies the core of evidence-based practice, which is to base clinical decisions on sound scientific evidence.

Other options, while relevant to clinical practice, do not directly align with the principles of evidence-based practice in the same way. Discussing medication choices or side effects, although important, centers on collaboration and communication rather than the evaluation of evidence itself. Reviewing the institutional formulary is relevant but more focused on administrative and institutional guidelines rather than an evidence-based assessment of treatment efficacy.