Step-by-Step Guide for Writing a Nursing Change Project Paper

Change in life is always inevitable. Things change, and we change with them even when we do not know it. However, in organizations, change is rare. People settle into routines, and rarely does change occur.

This is frequently the case in healthcare settings. Because of this, change often has to be instigated in such settings. We have new processes, systems, procedures, and protocols, all guided by research, facts, and evidence-based guidelines.

From innovative technologies to best practice approaches (evidence-based practice (EBP)) change in the healthcare setting is inevitable. These changes improve the healthcare systems and nursing practice; such that it is progressive in nature. And the recommended way to do it is through writing and implementing a change project.

In this guide, we will reveal to you how to write an effective change project. When you are done reading this guide, you should be able to come up with an excellent change project to improve or enhance healthcare provision in any healthcare system.

Let’s dive in.

What is a change project or change paper?            

Change rarely comes by itself—it has to be instigated and sustained. In the healthcare world, change, especially for the better, is not spontaneous. It is triggered through meticulous planning and this planning is done by writing a change paper.

A well-written change paper can help to create change in a healthcare setting. It can make inefficient healthcare setting more efficient, improve healthcare service delivery, or help to reduce the workload on healthcare workers or practitioners. In other words, it can help to identify a problem and create a plan to eliminate that problem.

Now that you know the meaning of a change project, let’s examine the most common nursing change theories. These are the models most commonly used to bring about change in healthcare settings.

Nursing Change Management Theories   

In most cases, you will be required to select a change management theory when writing your nursing change project. When the time comes, here is a summary that can help you brainstorm the best change theory to use in your project.  

Your nursing change project can also be anchored in nursing theories. You can also use non-nursing theories to make everything happen.

How to Choose a Change Management Theory

As it is clear in the table above, there are different models one can consider to cause a change in a healthcare setting. The most common one is Lippitt’s Seven-Step Change Theory. And the second most common model is Lewin’s Change Theory.

These two change theories are very common because they are the easiest to use. They are the easiest to use to bring about change in nursing practices. Therefore, when writing a change project or paper and you do not know what change management theory to use, choose one of these two.

The best thing about these two change management theories is that they are nurturing. This makes them perfect for bringing change to nursing practices because they both match the nurturing/supportive nature of the nursing profession.

How to Write a Change Paper or Change Project

With the knowledge of the most common nursing change management theories and how to choose one for a change project, it is time to know how to write a change project/change paper. Writing a change project entail applying a nursing change management theory to help bring a change or solve a problem in a healthcare setting. This section provides a step-by-step guide you can follow to put together a professional change project.

1. Read the Instructions

When you receive your change project assignment, the first thing you need to do is to read the instructions. You need to read the instructions slowly and keenly to understand them. Read them twice or thrice to understand what is needed of you in the change paper assignment you have been given by your professor. 

When reading the instructions in the assignment, you should particularly focus on the topic, the word count, the format, the style, and the grading rubric. These pieces of information are crucial to producing a high-quality change paper in nursing school. If you don’t understand anything, ask your professor for clarification.

2. Observe your Environment

Sometimes, the topic is very specific. You are asked to write a change paper to provide a solution to a specific problem or issue in a made-up healthcare facility. Other times, you are asked to go write a change paper that can apply to the healthcare setting or facility where you do your nursing clinicals.

Observe the environment if this is the case in your change paper assignment. Observe the environment by looking at how everything is done in it. Look at how patients are received, how information is collected, how patients are cared for, how medicine is administered, and so on. In other words, observe all the nursing practices.

If you notice anything that can be improved in the nursing process, note it down. Note down all the issues you can find in your healthcare setting.

3. Identify an area that needs Change

Once you list everything that can be improved, narrow down the issues. Therefore, if you identified three issues or areas that could do with a change, narrow them down to three in order of importance. In order of importance, we mean you should strike out all the minor issues and only leave issues/problems that are significant.

Once you are left with only a handful of issues, start research. Lightly research each issue and its potential solutions. Make sure you only look for solutions in credible nursing resources. The issue with the easiest or simplest solution is the one you should write about.

Remember, when you are asked to write a change project at the college level, it is only for practice. Your professor wants you to write an excellent change paper. They don’t expect you to develop a landmark paper that will change an area of nursing as we know it. So don’t bother trying to provide a solution to a complicated issue or problem. Identify the easiest problem and write a change paper on it.

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4. Choose a change Theory

After identifying the easiest problem and its solution, it is time to pick a change management theory. You can use several change management theories to introduce the change (solution) you have found in your research. Choose the one most suitable for the change (solution) you are trying to introduce.

Most nursing students use Lewin’s change theory in their change projects. This is because it is the easiest change management theory to use. So, if it suits the solution you have identified, use it. If it is unsuitable, choose a more appropriate change theory for your solution.

5. Plan (Outline) Your Change Management Paper

After identifying the easiest issue to solve, its solution, and a suitable change theory, it is time to outline or plan your change management paper. A typical nursing change management paper will have the following elements.

Nursing change management outline

• Introduction
• Problem statement
• Nursing theory
• Steps for implementing change (including the timeline)
• Potential Barriers and Solutions
• Evaluation and Follow-up
• Conclusion and recommendation

When outlining your change project, clearly state the problem or issue you have identified, the nursing theory you have chosen to solve it, and the steps you will take. Of course, all the other sections of the outline are just as important as these three sections. So do not ignore or focus less on them than on these sections.

6. Research to Gather Scholarly Sources

This is where you go deeper into research on the issue you are trying to solve. You already did a little research to find the solution to this problem, so you already know where to look for the solution (the literature to focus on).

Ensure the solution you get is easy to implement to get the desired change. Make sure there is a way to measure the success of the solution. Note down every important bit of information you discover about the solution.

Of course, you should also research the change theory you have chosen a bit deeper and gather information, especially about its steps.

7. Write the change project

After conducting good research to help you discuss the problem/issue and its solution, you will be ready to write your nursing school change project.

The easiest way to write a change project is to focus on following the outline you created in STEP 5 above. The outline has everything you need to organize your change paper.

You simply need to follow it and expand on the sections you outlined. Use the research you conducted in STEP 6 above to correctly detail the problem statement, the change management theory you chose, its steps, and the potential barriers and solutions to the change.

Conclude your change paper with a conclusion and recommendations. Do not forget to include all the in-text citations and a references section. No academic paper is complete without these two elements.

8. Edit and Proofread

After writing your nursing change project, edit it before submitting it. Before editing it, look at the grading rubric. If you want an excellent grade, ensure your paper meets the description on the rubric for a high-grade paper.

Make sure you proofread to remove all the basic errors, including grammar errors, punctuation errors, and so on. Then edit your paper to ensure it has a good flow and organization of ideas. And then reread it to ensure everything is easy to understand.

After proofreading and editing your paper as described above, proofread it using grammar software like Grammarly.com. This product will help you catch errors you might not easily catch.

An alternative to using Grammarly.com is sending the paper to a friend and asking them to help proofread it for you.

9. Submit your change project

If you follow all the steps above correctly, your change project will be ready for submission or presentation. Simply submit it to your professor following the requirements in your assignment file.

Nursing Change Project Ideas

This section presents a list of exciting change project topics you can use as inspiration to develop your own change project topic or idea.

1. Alternative wound care methods for patients having diabetes
2. Best pain relief practices for drug abuse patients
3. Best ways of dealing with aggressive patient relatives
4. Best methods for handling eating disorder patients
5. Improvement of bedside shift reporting
6. Improvement of record-keeping
7. Enhancing nutrition in the wards
8. Enhancing the COVID vaccination uptake
9. Improving student readiness for RN work
10. Better methods of home-based diabetes treatment
11. Improving recovery for anesthesia patients
12. Obesity prevention strategies for children
13. Reducing scrapes and bumps in care homes
14. Review of systems for the diagnosis of rare diseases
15. Treatment of diabetes patients without medication
16. Improvement treatment guidelines for a specific disease or disorder
17. Reviewing the roles of the staff on an ICU floor
18. Improving adherence to medication by specific groups of patients
19. Reducing congestion at the ER departments
20. Reducing blood contamination in the laboratory
21. Increasing vaccination uptake by indigenous groups
22. Improving infant care within a community
23. Promoting exclusive breastfeeding among mothers
24. Reducing postpartum depression among new mothers
25. Improving recovery rates of elderly patients
26. Reducing patient falls within the healthcare settings
27. Improving nutrition within the healthcare settings
28. Curbing smoking and alcoholism among the hospital staff
29. Encouraging the nurses to advance their educating
30. Addressing nursing shortages at a facility
31. Improving the quality of shadowing experience within a healthcare setting
32. Improving response to road traffic accident patients in the emergency departments

In some cases, you will be required to come up with a PICOT question before developing your EBP change project.

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Tips and Tricks for Writing an excellent nursing change project

1. Identify an area that needs change. Make sure you choose to change something interesting to make your paper interesting.
2. Pick an easy-to-understand change theory. If you pick a change theory that you find difficult to understand, you will find it difficult to write an excellent change paper.
3. Create a plan. If you start writing your change paper, the change paper will not be well-organized and you will most likely get stuck several times.
4. Edit your work. The difference between an average change project and an excellent one is usually the editing. Excellent change projects are almost always those that are well-edited.

We Can Help with Your Nursing School Change Project

From the guide we provided in this post, it should be clear that writing a nursing school change project is not easy. Nevertheless, if you are determined, the information in this post is adequate to help any solemn student nurse to write an A-grade change project.

If, despite reading this post/guide, you do not feel confident enough to write an above-average change project, you should work with us. Order a nursing school change project from us and get 100% custom paper in two to three days.

If you choose to work with us:

1. You will get help from an expert: Your paper will be assigned to a nursing academic who will know what they need to do to write an A-grade paper. They will adequately research, outline, write, reference, and edit your paper to ensure the final draft is a fantastic nursing school project. Our experts can take your online nursing class.
2. You will be working with a serious company: You can get your change project written by another assignment help company. But they probably cannot guarantee you the kind of professionalism we can guarantee. Our company ensures every assignment is properly edited and delivered on time.
3. You will get quality content: All our writing experts know how to conduct thorough research to find quality content and to use that content to generate 100% quality and original content. You will never find plagiarized content in any of our papers.
4. You will be getting total confidentiality: We have a strict confidentiality policy. We never share client information or even the papers we write. Our experts are also strictly instructed never to share the papers they write for our clients. So, you can be sure of 100% confidentiality every time you work with us.
5. You will get a competitive price: Our prices are very client-friendly. We know virtually all our clients are students who are not yet getting serious income. Because of this, our prices are almost always on the lower side.

In conclusion, if you order your nursing school change project from us, you will get a high-quality change project that will earn you an excellent grade.