How to Write a PICOT Paper

WHAT IS A PICOT PAPER?

A PICOT paper is a type of research paper, typically assigned in healthcare-related disciplines and in nursing school that is meant to explore a research question in a structure manner. PICOT is an acronym that refers to patient, problem or population, intervention, comparison, outcome, and timeframe. Some PICOT papers do not involve the time frame dimensions and are known as PICO Papers. Either way, a PICOT paper represents a highly structured type of healthcare of nursing paper in which you must absolutely touch on all of the elements of the PICOT acronym to receive a good grade.

With this in mind, writing a PICOT Paper means that you must successfully highlight all of the components of PICOT. This means that you must first choose a person, population or problem. Then, you must choose a potential intervention in relation to this person, population or problem. In turn, you must then determine how you will compare the effects of this intervention with other interventions or with an absence of interventions. You must then compare outcomes and if the time frame dimension is being used, you must integrate this time frame into your conceptualization of your PICOT paper. At the end of the process of writing your PICOT paper, your goal is typically to determine the utility or usefulness of the intervention that you studied in relation to your outcome of concern. When writing your PICOT paper, this should be your main focus.

Many PICOT papers will be written on a pre-determined topic. Your professor will provide you with a given problem or population and ask you to develop a PICOT question or hypothesis in relation to it. From there, you will use the existing literature to examine the outcomes produced by the intervention you are examining. Your task will then be to gather the results of as many studies pertaining to your intervention and outcome as possible so as to answer the question that lies at the heart of your PICOT Paper. Does the intervention you chose produce positive outcomes for the population, person or problem that you are writing your PICOT paper about?

Ultimately, a PICOT Paper is a highly structured and specially formatted nursing or healthcare research paper that follows the acronym-based model elaborated upon above. This is the defining feature of writing a PICOT paper. Unlike other nursing and healthcare research papers, PICOT papers will always follow the PICOT structure, and you will not have much room to depart from this structure. Because writing a successful PICOT paper requires that you touch on all of the elements making up the acronym PICOT, learning how to write a PICOT paper requires that you understand what the PICOT model is, and internalize its components effectively.

When you are writing a PICOT Paper, you must first focus on the population, person or problem that you are interested in researching. If this person, problem or population has already been provided to you, writing your PICOT Paper simply involves choosing a given intervention and outcome, and examining the scholarly literature in relation to data regarding the nexus formed by this intervention and outcome. Writing your PICOT paper means determining what type of harm or benefit is brought about by the intervention that you are studying, as measured by outcomes, in terms of the population, person or problem you are studying. From this perspective, you must always focus on these elements of PICOT when answering your PICOT question.

As you are writing your PICOT Paper, it is important that you constantly remember that you must include the person, problem or population, the intervention, the form of the comparison you are undertaking, the outcome being measured, and the time frame of your analysis. Simply incorporating all of these elements in your PICOT Paper is likely to get you a passing grade as the goal of PICOT papers is to teach nurses and other healthcare professionals to think about health-related problems and optimal interventions. Writing a very successful PICOT paper will determine the connection between your chosen intervention and outcome in relation to your problem, population or person of choice and discussing these results to provide implications for nursing practice.

When you are writing your PICOT paper, it is important to maintain a focus on the specific area that you are examining. As you are focusing on a given intervention and outcome in relation to a specific person, population or problem, you are likely to find sources that are loosely related to your topic. You should ignore these loosely related sources when writing your PICOT Paper. Because writing a PICOT paper is focus on the nexus of the problem, person or population, the outcome and the intervention, it is important that you stick to sources that are discussing the specific outcome and intervention you are examining. Do not veer far from this PICOT nexus when you are writing your PICOT paper or your professor or teacher will give you a poor grade for writing too broad of a PICOT paper.

In the end and with PICOT papers being very common in nursing programs and other healthcare-related disciplines, you need to master writing the PICOT format if you are to graduate from your program. PICOT is a standardized writing model that is meant to allow you to think systematically about healthcare issues. Given that your professors expect you to make use of the PICOT model when you are eventually providing care as a nurse or allied health professional, you must not only learn how to write through the PICOT model. You must also learn what the PICOT model means and be able to integrate the PICOT model into your everyday activities as a nurse or other healthcare practitioner because the PICOT model has been associated with the maximization of the best patient outcomes across a wide variety of healthcare settings.

HOW TO FORMAT A PICOT PAPER

A PICOT Paper is formatted very similarly to a traditional research paper. Like a research paper, it will have a thesis that connects the problem, person or population being studied with the intervention and outcome being analyzed. The difference between a PICOT Paper and a standard research paper is tied to the fact that you must stick to the PICOT format, hitting all five elements of the acronym, when you are writing a PICOT paper. When structuring your PICOT Paper, you may wish to use the components of the PICOT Acronym as headings. Most nursing programs use APA format and you should cite your references as such when writing a PICOT paper unless you are told to do otherwise. If you format your PICOT paper in this way when you write a PICOT paper, you are very likely to get a good grade.

WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A RESEARCH PAPER AND A PICOT PAPER?

The main difference between a research paper and a PICOT Paper is the use of the PICOT structure. With the PICOT structure being quite rigid in terms of what must be included versus excluded in a given research paper, the presence of the five elements of PICOT is the primary characteristic of a PICOT paper. This differentiates it from a traditional research paper because writing such a research paper gives you more opportunities for creativity in terms of organization. Writing a PICOT Paper instead means sticking to the PICOT form and respecting all of its elements. In terms of referencing and formatting, writing a PICOT Paper is just like writing a traditional research paper except for the fact that almost all PICOT Papers use APA style while research papers can vary in the referencing styles that they make use of.