The effects of teaching basic cardiopulmonary resuscitation--a comparison between first and sixth year medical students

The purpose of this study was to check if medical students of one of the Universities of Medical Sciences in Poland are prepared to do basic cardiopulmonary resuscitation. The research was undertaken on groups of 50 first year students and 50 sixth year students at the time when they take an exam. To have wider insight into students' ability to perform basic cardiopulmonary resuscitation, quantitative and qualitative methods were used. Students' knowledge of resuscitation was checked by a written test including open questions, their skills of doing resuscitation were checked on manikins. Students also completed a questionnaire. The results showed that first year medical students have a better knowledge of basic cardiopulmonary resuscitation compared with sixth year students. The skills of advanced cardiopulmonary resuscitation are better in sixth year students compared with first year students. The study showed that skills of ventilation and chest compressions need more practice. The students' own estimation of the ability to perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation both in the first and sixth years is very high, but it does not correlate with their knowledge and skills. Our conclusions indicate the need to improve the programme of teaching cardiopulmonary resuscitation with a refresher course in theory and skills at least once a year.     

Nursing students' experience of their first professional encounter with people having mental disorders

The aim of the study was to generate a theoretical model of what nursing students experience in their first professional encounter with people having mental disorders. Data was collected by interviewing 11 nursing students, selected by strategic sampling. Grounded theory analysis was chosen for the study. Findings showed that the students' personal qualities and the patients' behaviour affected the students' experience. When nursing students who had their own needs in focus met patients who rejected them, they felt helpless, and patients wishing to establish a relationship with them confirmed their positive or negative expectations. Nursing students who were focused on patients' needs met the patient as a unique person and felt confident despite being rejected by the patient, as well as proud when the patients wished to establish a relationship with them. Clinical university teachers can use the findings to gain knowledge about how each student feels as well as to guide them through their psychiatric training. The sample is small and further research is needed to generalize the findings of this study and to explore how nursing students, specialist psychiatric nurses and nurses in other disciplines experience the encounter with patients as well as how patients describe encounters with caregivers.     

Attitudes of university students towards HIV/AIDS

The purpose of this study was to assess, in one university in Finland, students' attitudes and feelings towards HIV/AIDS while they were studying for their first year at the University of Oulu. This study is part of a larger research project concerning HIV/AIDS in the Department of Nursing at the University of Oulu. The results can be used in planning and implementing health education for young people. The data were collected by using a questionnaire with both structured and open-ended questions. The study group consisted of 245 students who had started their studies in the autumn of 1993. The data were analysed by using cross tabulation (chi-square test) and inductively by content analysis. The most important source of knowledge concerning HIV/AIDS was television (84%) and 30% of the students had obtained their knowledge from a school nurse. Even when there was a lot of knowledge available to the students, they estimated their knowledge as insufficient and defined HIV more correctly than AIDS. Knowledge did not increase the use of safe sex but limited sexual behaviour. Religion had an importance for sexual behaviour. Female students were more sexually active than male students. The feelings towards HIV/AIDS were more often negative than positive or neutral and the students felt stronger negative feelings towards AIDS than HIV. The negative feelings were often based on fear. The differences between the faculties were minimal.     

Development and testing of a CD-ROM based tutorial for nursing students: getting ready for HIPAA

The purpose of this study was to develop and test a CD-ROM tutorial for nursing students to educate them on how the rules and regulations of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) affect them as they engage in patient care activities in hospitals. The project was completed in two parts, the first of which was production of a stand-alone, audio lecture, image and text self-instruction on CD-ROM to distribute to students as they began their clinical experience. The second part compared the effectiveness of learning the HIPAA content via CD-ROM to a text-directed, self study method. Students were pretested and randomly assigned to one of the types of instruction based on their seminar group assignment. One group received the CD-ROM, Getting Started with HIPAA, along with a journal article on HIPAA, while the other (control) group received only the journal article. All students were instructed to prepare for a test on their understanding about HIPAA by the end of the clinical rotation. The test was analyzed, and items clarified to yield a reliable Web-based examination with 20 questions, 18 of which were used in the analysis. The students' scores were analyzed before and after the instruction, and the methods of instruction were compared. The study findings demonstrated significant differences between experimental-group and control-group students' performance on a knowledge test of HIPAA, as well as overall satisfaction with learning the material by CD-ROM among students who used it. The tutorial is now available for all students, and the Web-based examination provides automatic scoring to a preestablished competence level.     

‘What colour is my cancer?’ The experience of teenagers and young adults who are shown their cancer samples through a microscope

One of the well-known needs of teenagers and young adults with cancer (TYAs) is their quest for knowledge about their illness and its treatment. As well as this they desire to be treated as partners and as an integral part of the team who care for them.This small exploratory study aims to address these issues in the development of a unique project where the young people were given unprecedented access to their own cancer samples and to the professional experts who analyse those samples.This small cohort of 31 TYAs, aged 13–24 years, were invited to look at their samples under a microscope and discuss it with the experts; of these 4 declined. A number of questionnaires, containing both open and closed questions, were given before, immediately post and one month after the viewing session. The results were analysed using SPSS13 and content analysis.The study was able to establish that viewing cancer samples had no measurable effect on the TYAs gaining of new knowledge, sense of control or choices that they made. However, it did show how the young people felt in light of actually ‘seeing’ their own cancer, and how this seemed to improve the overall perception of their disease. This is a new body of knowledge that requires further, more detailed, rigorous work.     

Nursing homes as learning environments: the impact of professional dialogue

Nursing students' clinical experiences are important with respect to their impact on attitudes towards care for older people and preferences for future workplaces. The purpose of this paper is to explore how professional dialogue has an impact on nursing students' clinical learning and professional development in nursing homes. A qualitative design based on field work, field notes and qualitative research interviews was employed with 12 third year nursing students undergoing clinical practise in three nursing homes in Norway. The nursing students who participated in this study displayed positive attitudes towards older people. However, their experiences and perceptions of the learning environment in the nursing homes, varied. The nursing students expressed that a positive learning environment included participation in nursing care and professional dialogue to support their learning process and outcomes. Their primary wish was to develop their knowledge about care for older people through participation and dialogue as critical and reflective processes in a community of practise.     

The erect walking of the soul or: the dignity of a broken life

Getting the diagnosis of "paraplegia" means an extremely deep cut into someone's life. Suddenly everything is changed. Questions are arising: Why me? What is the meaning behind this? Pastoral care accompanies patients and their families during these hard weeks and months. There is time for people and their pain. It is not about offering easy solutions but about helping people to find their own language to express their inner experience and hopefully in the end, to find their own way with the disability. There is hope that something new can arise from the fragments of one's former life.     

Student nurses' attitudes towards adolescents and their care in hospital

The aim of this study was to explore nursing students' attitudes towards adolescents and their care in hospital. A questionnaire containing a series of open-ended questions was emailed to a sample of 50 child branch degree-level students in their second, third or fourth year at a West Midlands university; 14 (28 per cent) responded. It was found that the students had a good knowledge of young people and of their needs while in hospital. They did not report strong negative attitudes towards adolescents but suggested that a number of factors affected their attitudes towards nursing young people, including media reports and the attitudes of mentors. Most of the students expressed a preference for working with younger children, partly because the students lacked experience and confidence, and partly because of a lack of age-appropriate resources in ward areas, which made caring for adolescents more challenging. It was concluded that more could be done to improve student exposure to adolescent patients and that inadequate inpatient facilities, rather than staff attitudes and knowledge, may prevent some young people receiving good quality care in hospital.     

Learning to nurse the elderly: outcome measures

This study explores the impact of a planned learning experience with the elderly on BScN students' level of knowledge about aging. Data were gathered by means of Palmore's 'Facts on Aging Quiz', an instrument which has been validated as a measure of knowledge. Findings revealed that a learning experience requiring that students have contact and planned experience with essentially well older people who were living and functioning relatively independently was effective in increasing their level of knowledge about aging as well as lessening negative stereotypes associated with the aged.     

护理学导论在成人教育中教学方法的探讨

《护理学导论》是护理学专科、本科教育中新增设的一门基础课程 ,蕴涵了当前护理学先进的基础理论、基础知识。成人学生在基础教育阶段未接受这门课程的学习。对 5 8名成人在校学生的基本情况进行了调研 ,分析了成人学生学习这门课程的难点、薄弱点 ,指出针对课程不同内容采用传统教学方法、多媒体教学法、录像、问题讨论、角色扮演、分析科研论文等多种教学方法 ,以提高教学质量 ,培养实用型护理人才。     

The effect of inaccurate FIM instrument ratings on prospective payment: a study of clinician expertise and FIM rating difficulty as contributing to inaccuracy

OBJECTIVE: To test whether clinician expertise and FIM instrument rating difficulty explain clinician overconfidence in FIM rating accuracy. DESIGN: Participants answered 60 true/false FIM questions and, for each question, completed a 6-category scale to assess confidence in the accuracy of their responses. Experts and novices, as well as hard and easy items, were identified through a Rasch analysis. The relation between confidence and accuracy was examined for these different groups. SETTING: Three urban medical centers. PARTICIPANTS: Fifty medical rehabilitation professionals, including physical therapists, occupational therapists, rehabilitation psychologists, speech pathologists, and rehabilitation nurses. INTERVENTIONS: Not applicable. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Observed proportion of correct responses to 60 true/false questions and responses from the 6-category confidence scale. RESULTS: The amount of overconfidence was mediated by the difficulty of the FIM task and the level of expertise of the clinical judge. CONCLUSIONS: Decreasing the level of overconfidence in FIM scoring is a promising avenue for improving the accuracy of functional assessment. Accurate assessment of functional status for case-mix group classification will be of even greater importance under the recently initiated Medicare prospective payment system.     

Using cooperative learning in clinical laboratory science education.

OBJECTIVE: To compare performance of students instructed by cooperative learning (CL) activities with those taught by lecture. A secondary objective was to assess students' perceptions about their ability to work in teams before and after their exposure to these instructional approaches. DESIGN/SETTING/PARTICIPANTS: CL was incorporated into the immunology/serology course of a university-based clinical laboratory science (CLS) program. Twenty-two students participated in a 4-week study and were randomly assigned to one of two study groups. INTERVENTION: One group received the course material by CL activities, and the other group was exposed to the material through lecture. MAIN OUTCOMES MEASURE: Mean examination scores for CL and lecture groups were compared using an independent samples t-test. Teamwork knowledge, skills, and attitude (KSA) assessment rated students' perceptions of their ability to work in a team environment pre and post tests were compared using a 2 x 2 repeated measures ANOVA. RESULTS: No significant difference was found between mean examination scores of students who acquired their knowledge by CL activities (85.09%) and those taught by lecture (82.18%). Teamwork KSA means scores pre and post tests (22.5, 22.6 CL; 22.7, 21.6 lecture) were not significantly different. CONCLUSION: Results suggest that the incorporation of CL activities did not reduce the students' academic performance or self-perceptions of their ability to work in teams. The use of CL in the classroom, student laboratory, or clinical setting may help prepare students for the role they will be expected to perform as laboratory professionals.     

Do no harm: progression policies and high-stakes testing in nursing education

Many schools of nursing are adopting progression policies to ensure that school licensure pass rates remain above acceptable levels. These policies prevent students who are predicted to fail the licensure examination from taking the examination, usually by preventing graduation from or completion of the nursing program. Progression policies frequently rely on a single test score from a predictive exit examination, such as the Health Education Systems, Inc. (HESI) Exit Examination, as a measure of whether students are likely to pass or fail the licensure examination and, therefore, whether they are permitted to graduate from the nursing program. In this article, questions about the HESI Exit Examination's test-use validity are explored. Best practices in testing and assessment require faculty to perform a more comprehensive assessment of students' abilities and to not rely on one predictor alone when making important educational decisions. Recommendations and suggestions are provided to guide faculty in decision making about progression policies.     

Nursing students' knowledge and beliefs about care of older adults in a shifting context of nursing education

baumbusch j., dahlke s. & phinney a. (2012)?Nursing students' knowledge and beliefs about care of older adults in a shifting context of nursing education. Journal of Advanced Nursing68(11), 2550-2558. ABSTRACT: Aim. To a report a study of improvements in students' knowledge and beliefs about nursing care of older adults following completion of an introductory course with integrated adult/older adult content. Background. Nursing schools are under pressure to provide accelerated programmes to meet growing workforce demands and provide students with the knowledge they require to care for an ageing population. Thus, stand-alone courses in gerontological nursing are being eliminated and integrated with general adult content. The effect of this approach remains poorly understood. Design. A one-group pretest-post-test design was used. Methods. Data were collected between September-December 2010. Students completed the Palmore Facts on Aging Quiz, the Perceptions of Caring for Older People Scale, and open-ended questions about their experiences before and after completing a course with integrated adult/older content. Results. Students' knowledge and beliefs about nursing care of older adults demonstrated an important improvement following completion of the course. Qualitative findings reflected three themes: relating to older people; neglect by the system; having time to learn. Conclusions. Findings from this study suggest that even when integrated with general adult content, students' knowledge and beliefs about older adult care can be positively influenced. Furthermore research is needed to examine long-term integration of students' learning about older adult care. Nursing faculty with expertise in nursing care of older adults must develop resources and supports for their colleagues to build capacity among nurse educators and integrate older adult content throughout nursing programmes to enhance nursing practice with an ageing population.     

The impact of a distance learning death and dying course: an analysis of student self-reported changes

Educational programmes are under way to improve knowledge, awareness and skills in holistic end-of-life care. Not all people can access education and continued professional development in a conventional face-to-face setting. The UK Open University's distance learning course entitled 'Death and Dying' (K260) attracts a broad spectrum of British and foreign students, including those who undertake the course for work-related purposes, and those who have a personal or academic interest in the area. This study explored students' self-reported satisfaction with the course primarily whether respondents perceived changes in their attitudes or practices. Two questionnaires were posted to students registered on K260, the first at the beginning of the course and the second, to those who returned the first questionnaire, following the final examination. Most respondents reported satisfaction with the quality and content of K260. Irrespective of whether respondents worked with dying or bereaved people, most felt that the course: encouraged reflection on personal beliefs and/or attitudes towards death and dying; furthered their knowledge of palliative care; increased their understanding of relevant ethical, legal and moral issues; raised their awareness of religious and cultural issues; and helped them develop skills to deal more effectively with dying and bereaved people.     

An internship for college students in physical medicine and rehabilitation: effects on awareness, career choice, and disability perceptions

OBJECTIVE: To show the impact that an internship program in Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (PM&R) for college students has on their knowledge about the field, career choice, and perceptions about people with disabilities. DESIGN: Twelve students were selected to participate in the study. Students observed patient therapies and followed faculty and physiatry resident physicians. Students also participated in research studies in rehabilitation research. Group discussions regarding specific projects, research methods, career choice, and perceptions about disability were part of a didactic curriculum. Surveys about PM&R knowledge, attitudes toward people with disabilities, demographics, and course evaluations were administered. RESULTS: Results showed that the program increased knowledge about PM&R (P < 0.008). Premedical students missed significantly fewer questions (8.2 vs. 11.7; P = 0.04) on this survey than did other participants. Results also showed that this program affected their attitudes toward people with disabilities and student choice to pursue a career in health care. CONCLUSIONS: This type of internship experience provides an educational environment for college students to become acquainted with PM&R, interact positively with people with disabilities, and influence career choice in the allied health professions.