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Statistical Reasoning - Article Analysis Paper
I. Introduction and Article Set up
After searching for several days on the internet, and reading several statistical studies, I
selected the article, “Violence in the Emergency Department: A Survey of Health Care
Workers.” The article was written by Christopher M.B. Fernandes, France Bouthillette, Janet M.
Raboud, Lindo Bullock, et al. This study was designed to determine if there was violence in the
Emergency Department of a certain hospital and the effect it had on the workers, the victims of
the violence. The article was found at http://www.cmaj.ca/content/161/10/1245. I particularly
liked this article because of a related study I read some years ago about violence at workplaces,
and I wanted to find out the nature and extent of violence in the Emergency Department of a
care-giving facility. As was said by Fernandes, et al, “Violence in the workplace is an ill-defined
and underreported concern for Health Care Workers.”
For the most part, the article was well organized and easy to follow. The abstract was
labelled and summarized the background, methods, and interpretation of the objectives of the
study methods section of the paper. It gave information on the nature of the survey, the design
and how the survey was carried out. It was “ A retrospective written survey of all 163
Emergency Department Employees..,” (Fernandes, et al,1999). The survey collected data
regarding the definition of violence, extent of the violence, and the level of stress endured as a
result of the violence, among other things.
The section labeled “Results”, gave details on the total number of persons who responded to
the survey (106 /65%). A breakdown of the number of Nurses, Protection Services Personnel,
, 2
Physicians, Clerks, Social Workers, Licensed Practical Nurses, Unit Coordinators, Ward-Aids
and Porters, was given. These are the categories of workers around which the study was
centered. The Results also included the mean age (37 years) of those who responded, the number
of men and women respondents (63 women, 43 men), the average working years in the
Emergency Department (9.2 years), the number of full-time staff (58), part-time staff (27) and
casual workers (21). One graph and two tables were also given as part of the results.
A section of the paper was labelled and organized under “Interpretation.” There was no
section for conclusion. It was given as part of the Interpretation. The interpretation reiterated
what may be said to be the hypothesis of the study, gave a summary of the findings and
examined the findings in relation to the persons involved in the study. It also examined what the
findings showed in relation to work attitude and stress, and briefly discussed how the findings
may be used.
II. Sample Selection/Randomizer.
The survey did not use a sample from the population of the Hospital Department which was
being studied. According to Fernandes, et al, “We distributed a questionnaire to all 163
Emergency Department staff...” Nothing was stated as to why actual samples were not used; one
possible reason is that the population of the Emergency Department of the Hospital was quite
small, ( 163 persons). This small group raises the question of how representative the “sample”
was of the broader population of Emergency Department Workers. I think that a random
selection of workers from the Emergency Department of randomly selected Hospitals in that area
would be more representative of the population of workers that the study is concerned with.
Using this method of selection is not only more representative of the worker population, but also
Statistical Reasoning - Article Analysis Paper
I. Introduction and Article Set up
After searching for several days on the internet, and reading several statistical studies, I
selected the article, “Violence in the Emergency Department: A Survey of Health Care
Workers.” The article was written by Christopher M.B. Fernandes, France Bouthillette, Janet M.
Raboud, Lindo Bullock, et al. This study was designed to determine if there was violence in the
Emergency Department of a certain hospital and the effect it had on the workers, the victims of
the violence. The article was found at http://www.cmaj.ca/content/161/10/1245. I particularly
liked this article because of a related study I read some years ago about violence at workplaces,
and I wanted to find out the nature and extent of violence in the Emergency Department of a
care-giving facility. As was said by Fernandes, et al, “Violence in the workplace is an ill-defined
and underreported concern for Health Care Workers.”
For the most part, the article was well organized and easy to follow. The abstract was
labelled and summarized the background, methods, and interpretation of the objectives of the
study methods section of the paper. It gave information on the nature of the survey, the design
and how the survey was carried out. It was “ A retrospective written survey of all 163
Emergency Department Employees..,” (Fernandes, et al,1999). The survey collected data
regarding the definition of violence, extent of the violence, and the level of stress endured as a
result of the violence, among other things.
The section labeled “Results”, gave details on the total number of persons who responded to
the survey (106 /65%). A breakdown of the number of Nurses, Protection Services Personnel,
, 2
Physicians, Clerks, Social Workers, Licensed Practical Nurses, Unit Coordinators, Ward-Aids
and Porters, was given. These are the categories of workers around which the study was
centered. The Results also included the mean age (37 years) of those who responded, the number
of men and women respondents (63 women, 43 men), the average working years in the
Emergency Department (9.2 years), the number of full-time staff (58), part-time staff (27) and
casual workers (21). One graph and two tables were also given as part of the results.
A section of the paper was labelled and organized under “Interpretation.” There was no
section for conclusion. It was given as part of the Interpretation. The interpretation reiterated
what may be said to be the hypothesis of the study, gave a summary of the findings and
examined the findings in relation to the persons involved in the study. It also examined what the
findings showed in relation to work attitude and stress, and briefly discussed how the findings
may be used.
II. Sample Selection/Randomizer.
The survey did not use a sample from the population of the Hospital Department which was
being studied. According to Fernandes, et al, “We distributed a questionnaire to all 163
Emergency Department staff...” Nothing was stated as to why actual samples were not used; one
possible reason is that the population of the Emergency Department of the Hospital was quite
small, ( 163 persons). This small group raises the question of how representative the “sample”
was of the broader population of Emergency Department Workers. I think that a random
selection of workers from the Emergency Department of randomly selected Hospitals in that area
would be more representative of the population of workers that the study is concerned with.
Using this method of selection is not only more representative of the worker population, but also
