In Canada, there has been little research to support ACNP roles in cardiac surgery settings and the research that has been conducted has had methodological limitations.
For example, Jensen and Scherr (2004) surveyed health care providers who worked with an ACNP in a cardiothoracic intensive care unit at a large tertiary care hospital,
and found that processes and outcomes of care were positively affected following implementation of the ACNP role.
However, this study had a low (n = 34/90) response rate that may introduce potential bias in the findings. Sidani et al.
(2006) used a cross-sectional design to compare the health outcomes of hospital in patients who received care from either ACNPs (n = 320) or medical residents (n = 46)