The DISCUSSION Section of a Research Article:

What does the Results Section Mean?

After reading the last few blog posts you should now be able to recognize a published research report as having these key sections:
Title
Abstract
Introduction
Methods 
Discussion

Key Point: Now we turn to DISCUSSION section  where the researcher tells you what the Results section means.   Discussion gives "the investigator's explanations of some of their findings and their opinions of what they think their study means for practice & future research" (p. 22, Davies & Logan, 2008).

Let’s see how this works by looking at an example of Results & then Discussion in Apfelbaum et al’s 2013 study of “Postoperative pain experience” published in Anesthesia and analgesia.

In the RESULTS section Apfelbaum et al’s statistical analysis results were:

Approximately two thirds of patients reported that a health care professional talked with them before surgery about how their pain would be treated….Overall, nurses were more likely than other health care professionals to educate patients about pain and pain management. Among surgical outpatients, surgeons were as likely as nurses to provide patient pain education, but nurses were more likely to provide this service for surgical inpatients. After surgery, two thirds of patients reported being asked by a health care professional about their pain, most frequently by a nurse….75% of patients believed that it was necessary to experience some pain after surgery, and 8% of patients had postponed surgery because they were worried about the possibility of experiencing pain (pp. 537-8)

You can see that the Results above tells only results of statistical tests.  In the DISCUSSION section Apfelbaum and co-authors explained what the Results mean for RNs & providers.

We were surprised to find that more than half of the patients surveyed were concerned about experiencing pain after surgery and that this caused some of them even to postpone surgery. Although most patients claimed to receive preoperative education on postoperative pain management, our findings suggest that a patient’s real concern is not adequately addressed.  Despite the increased focus on pain management over the last several years and the development of formal standards and guidelines for the management of acute pain, a significant number of patients continue to experience unacceptable levels of pain after surgery and after discharge. This fact is alarming, considering the trend toward ambulatory surgery and shorter hospital stays. (p. 539)

Critical thinking:  

FIRST read the following Results of a study by Fayh et al (2013) that was an experiment to test “the effects of 5 % weight loss, through diet only or diet plus exercise, on lipid profile, inflammation and endothelial function in obese individuals.”  THEN write your own Discussion section explaining what these results mean. 

Results: Thirteen individuals dropped out before completing the weight loss intervention. The median time required for reduction of 5 % of initial body weight was 79.7 days for the Diet group and 65.9 days for the Diet + Exercise group ( P = 0.16). In both Diet( n = 18) and Diet + Exercise ( n = 17), total cholesterol (−15.8 ± 4.8 and −10.5 ± 4.9 mg/dL, respectively), triglycerides (−33.8 ± 10.0 and −39.4 ± 10.3 mg/dL, respectively) and hs-CRP (−1.35 ± 0.41 and −0.45 ± 0.43 mg/L, respectively) decreased significantly, and in a similar response. (p. 1443)

FINALLY (if you like) you can then compare your Discussion to their Discussion section by getting a copy of their article from the library: Fayh, A. et al (2013). Effects of 5% weight loss through diet or diet plus exercise on cardiovascular parameters of obese: A randomized trial. European Journal of Nutrition, 52(5) 1443-50. doi http://dx.doi.org.libproxy.csun.edu/10.1007/s00394-012-0450-1