You should respond to at least two of your peers by extending or adding supplementary distinctions to their posts. Your reply posts are worth 40 points (20 points per respo

Statistics and How it is Important to my Everyday Life

Stephanie Alvarez

St. Thomas University

STA-2023-AP1

Professor Suarez

Due 03/16/2023

Statistics and How it is Important to my Everyday Life

Statistics is the study of collecting, organizing, summarizing and presenting information in the form of data to answer questions. Automatically when I think of statistics I think of conversations where I have used this term. For example, I may be having a conversation with someone and they state a cat's mouth is cleaner than a dog's mouth. In this case, I would come back and say, “well statistics show 80% of dogs and cats will acquire a form of dental disease in their lifetime.” This makes my argument stronger because I'm confirming based on data sets that both are at risk for dental disease. Thus further proving my argument that both cats and dogs are equally at risk for bad dental hygiene. When I think of the word statistics, I also think of populations and probability of things. The next term is statistical thinking. Statistical thinking is rational thinking to make decisions based on data collected. This to me is similar to evidence based practice. In nursing we have to think prior to doing things based on data collected from previous experience and studies in our field. We go in our minds to think and forecast prior to taking action based on the data we have in our head that we need to go through prior to treating our patients.

How statistics is used in my daily life

Now that I have gone over what I think statistics to be, I will now go over how statistics is important to me in everyday life and how it is used in my life. The main two sources where I use statistics in everyday life comes down to budgeting, entertainment and future employment. Everything I watch and view online is being analyzed by Netflix or Amazon so that they know how to market better to different audiences and so they know specifically how to target me through my algorithm through means of advertisements and suggested searches, etc. When it comes down to budgeting, I constantly try to forecast the months ahead. I do this by taking in the numbers I bring home after taxes from my employment and then I split this up into predicted grocery expenses and bills. After this I am able to estimate a good amount to place into my savings every time I get paid. I also use statistics when it comes to future employment opportunities. For example my new goal when applying to jobs is to stay away from HCA for-profit hospital systems. I do this based on researching nurse to patient ratios. I also base this off some of my own personal experiences where I have had up to 14 patients in an Emergency Room. A union study found HCA staffing levels were below average in 19 of the 20 states where it provided care in 2020 (Criss ., 2021). Another article showed that by the year 2021, 100,000 Registered Nurses quit HCA and left the nursing profession completely (Auerbach ., 2022).

How statistics is used in nursing

Statistics allows nurses to interpret descriptive data such as mean, median, standard deviation, range, and percentiles. Statistics also allows nurses to understand how to interpret odds ratios, which helps you to provide patients with the risk factors of different medications or lifestyle choices they make. So what does this mean? This means that as I am furthering my career I need to become more knowledgeable in statistics and applying data such as descriptive data as I am working. An example being the different percentiles of height, weight, blood pressure, and heart rate for a patient. Other ways are knowing the odds of disease progression as to what can happen if a patient works on improving their health or doesn't make any change. Whether it’d be by suggesting the patient to excercise or quit smoking further delaying or halting an onset of COPD or respiratory. We also need to know what percentile someone's weight falls in, to be able to further educate and treat this patient accordingly.

In conclusion, although I use statistics in everyday life, I am not fully made aware of this, which also means after completion of this course I should be able to apply data more into my daily and working life when it comes to analyzing and interpreting data to draw conclusions and make decisions.

References

Auerbach, D., Buerhaus, P., Donelan, K., & Staiger, D. (April 13, 2022). A Worrisome Drop In The Number Of Young Nurses Doi: 10.1377/forefront.20220412.311784

Criss, J. (Oct 12, 2021. Criss Jessica v. CHCA Clear Lake, LP d/b/a HCA Houston Healthcare Clear Lake. Texas District Court for Harris County. Case No. 2021-66815

Zach. (Aug 29, 2022). The Importance of Statistics in Nursing (With Examples). Doi: https://www.statology.org/importance-of-statistics-in-nursing/

Why Statistics is Important 

Vera Brito Delgado 

St. Thomas University 

Applied Statistics. STA 2023 AP1 

Instructor 

03/16/2023 

Why Statistics is Important  

Statistics encompasses collecting, analyzing, interpreting, and presenting empirical data (Bayot & Abdelgawad, 2022). Based on life experiences, statistics are vital to daily life, particularly in understanding general patterns and trends. Utilize statistics to determine changes in the patient's weight over a month. Apart from taking daily weight measurements, we can attain an average weight over one month or year while determining any decrease or increase in weight for appropriate intervention. The statistics can also be used to determine the amount of money spent on grocery store purchases every week. Budgeting is essential, and statistics help to estimate future shopping expenses. Statistics is util to determine the weather and choose the ideal clothing for the day. Using probability, we can ascertain whether the weather will be cold or warm. Statistics is essential when investing money in stocks by establishing growth potential. 

As a nurse, statistics is central to every aspect of nursing care. Statistics are utilized to determine trends in the patient flow, acuity levels, discharge levels, and length of stay. Statistics helps nurses calculate medication timing using frequency data sheets or charts (Bayot & Abdelgawad, 2022). Statistics is also crucial to evidence-based practice in nursing. Through statistics, we can read, understand, and interpret statistical findings in research and apply the evidence to current practice (Aggarwal, 2018). 

Moreover, statistics improve patient care, particularly in triaging and prioritizing patient care for patients who need immediate medical intervention. Statistics are also fundamental in helping nurses interpret descriptive statistics, including percentiles, range, standard deviation, mean, and median (Guetterman, 2019). In nursing research, statistics is integral to accurate data analysis and the presentation of findings to improve nursing practice and patient outcomes.   

References 

Aggarwal, R. (2018). Statistical literacy for healthcare professionals: Why is it important?  Annals of Cardiac Anaesthesia,  21(4), 349.  https://doi.org/10.4103/aca.aca_177_18 Links to an external site.  

Guetterman, T. C. (2019). Basics of statistics for primary care research.  Family Medicine and Community Health,  7(2), e000067.  https://doi.org/10.1136/fmch-2018-000067 Links to an external site.  

Statistics – StatPearls – NCBI bookshelf. (2022, May 8). National Center for Biotechnology Information.  https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK538315/ Links to an external site.  

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