Problem Statement Essay Example

Institutions:

Introduction
The healthcare industry plays a crucial role in the society with the industry players determining peoples’ health with their drugs and remedies. In that respect, the various types of treatments used are subject to great scrutiny regarding their safety and effectiveness. However, an alternative medicine that is increasingly being adopted as cost make conventional medicine more difficult have been subject to increasing concern over the effect on patients and the whole industry. In that view, this proposal proposes a study to analyze the effectiveness and the safety of the alternative medicine. The proposal provides the problem importance and statement, the research question as well as literature review summary. The proposal also provides the methodology to be applied and finally explains the study’s implications.

Proposal

Importance/relevance of problem
Health care research has been identified to have a significant role towards the enhancement of theories, practice and education health care. The current world requires health care providers to base their practice on updated body of knowledge as a means of providing effective interventions. It only through health care research on various processes and treatments that theories, education, as well as practice can be enhanced to respond effectively to patients’ needs. For this reason, research on the safety and effectiveness of the alternative medicine has a significant role to play. That will play a great role in enhancing the effectiveness of interventions as stakeholders will have a basis for consistent decisions making regarding he drugs efficiency and safety.

Difficulty in accessing conventional drugs and remedies has provided an opportunity for entrepreneurs to provide alternative medicines and remedies. However, are increasing concerns over the medicines safety as well as effectiveness. Thus, there is a need to identify the safety and effectiveness issues that need to be addressed as a means of enhancing the healthcare industry operations.

Summary of literature review

With the increase in health problems and the current economic challenges, people are increasingly facing difficulty in accessing and acquire reliable as well as sufficient medical care services. In that respect, traders have found an opportunity o exploit the situation by introducing uncertified alternatives medicines and treatments including herbal remedies (Tachjian, Maria, & Jahangir, 2010). As the herbal drugs contain chemical compositions, they also require proper handling in their use as medical remedies (NHS, 2014). However, research studies have indicated that most of the herbalists do not have adequate medical knowledge on balancing the various ingredients as a means of providing effective regiments. Thus, there is a high potential for some of them to produce and develop poisonous substances that could have significant medical challenges for end users (Kraft and Hobbs, 2011).
In addition, studies have shown that most of the herbal remedies that are available in contemporary markets lack proper prescriptions as well as dosage procedures hence risking the end users' lifes, mainly in regards to misuse or overdose (NHS, 2014). The use of alternative medicine may eventually result in death or worse health conditions (Tachjian, Maria & Jahangir, 2010). Finally, it has been identified that most of the medicines and procedures are not well and safely produced; resulting to some users developing some grave side effects including adverse body reaction as well as other body pains (NHS, 2014). The drugs also lack proper labeling thus becoming easy to misuse or mishandle them.

Research question

In view of the study that seeks to analyze the effectiveness and safety of alternative medicine use, the study will have two objectives. The first will involve identifying that safety of the alternative drugs and treatments on patients. The second objective involves identifying the effectiveness of those drugs and remedies in addressing patients’ problems. In view of the objectives, the study will be seeking to answer the question “Is alternative medicine effective and safe for patients use in comparison with the conventional medicine?”

Methodology

The analysis of the efficiency and safety of alternative medicine requires a population that has a direct experience with the drug’s use. Thus, the identified population includes patients using the remedies and drugs in three cities in the US. Stratified and random sampling will be applied given that respondents will be selected from three Cities thus a need for dividing the population into three regions and then applying random sampling in picking ten percent of the population in each city (Patton, 2002). On the other hand, data collection will be through secondary as well as primary techniques involving the use of industry reports on the drug’s effectiveness and safety. It will also involve questionnaires mailed to respondents. Further, descriptive statistics will be applied considering the nature of the information to be collected. There will also be establishing the suitability of the analysis as well as its significance to a number of tests including test of variables and results’ significance (Jacobsen, 2012).

Implications of the expected findings

Given the increasing concerns over the alternative medicine safety and effectiveness, the analysis will be crucial in shedding light on patients experiences compared to the use of conventional medicine. The study will be a useful guide to the industry authorities providing insight on the need for the alternative medicine regulation. In addition, the findings will be crucial in guiding safety areas that need to be addressed as a way of enhancing the industry's operations (Bick, Ian & Graham, 2013).

Conclusion

In view of the research proposal, there is an increase in the use of alternative medicine that is marked by unsafe products and ineffective remedies. In that respect, there is a need to identify the safety and effectiveness areas that need to be addressed. Thus he study will entail an descriptive analysis using 10% the patients who have used alternative medicine in three US cities as the sample that has been proposed to be collected through secondary and primary techniques as a means of enhancing he study's reliability. Finally, the results findings will be crucial to industry regulations as well as in pointing safety issues that the industry operators needs to address.

References

Bick, D. Ian & Graham, I. D. (2013). Evaluating the impact of implementing evidence-based practice. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.
Jacobsen, K. (2012). Introduction to Health Research Methods. London: Jones & Bartlett Learning.
Kraft, K. and Hobbs, C. (2011). Pocket guide to herbal medicine. London: Theme Press.
NHS. (2014). Herbal medicines. Retrieved from, http://www.nhs.uk/conditions/herbal-medicines/Pages/Introduction.aspx
Patton, M. Q. (2002). Qualitative evaluation and research methods. 3rd Ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, Inc.
Tachjian, A., Maria, V., & Jahangir, A. (2010). Use of herbal products and potential interactions in patients with cardiovascular diseases. Journal of the American College of Cardiology, 55(6), 515-525.