Basic Statistical Concepts for Nurses

As the context of health care is changing due to the pharmaceutical services and technological advances, nurses and other health care professionals need to be prepared to respond in knowledgeable and practical ways. Health information is very often explained in statistical terms for making it concise and understandable. Statistics plays a vitally important role in the research. Statistics help to answer important research questions and it is the answers to such questions that further our understanding of the field and provide for academic study. It is required the researcher to have an understanding of what tools are suitable for a particular research study. It is essential for healthcare professionals to have a basic understanding of basic concepts of statistics as it enables them to read and evaluate reports and other literature and to take independent research investigations by selecting the most appropriate statistical test for their problems. The purpose of analyzing data in a study is to describe the data in meaningful terms.