Nursing Program Outcome Improves with Interprofessional Simulation.

AIMS: Simulation-based education in nursing education has been shown to be as effective as experiences in the actual clinical environment; however, little evidence exists on the assessment of simulation in multidisciplinary teams to assess program outcomes. The purpose of this research study was to investigate nursing program outcome data specific to interprofessional collaboration in a simulation experience involving nursing and physical therapy (PT) compared to data from this same simulation experience involving nursing only. METHODS: Senior nursing students from two different cohorts, cohort A (n=58) and cohort B (n=47), and 14 PT students participated as learners in the simulation investigated in this research study. Three to 4 nursing students and 1 PT student were randomly placed into an interprofessional team to care for two patients. Nursing students were evaluated on program outcome competencies by nursing educators. RESULTS: The Mann Whitney U-test indicated a significant difference in performance scores for the program outcome specific to interprofessional collaboration between nursing students in cohort A (+PT) and nursing students in cohort B (-PT), p<0.05. CONCLUSIONS: The results of this study demonstrate that two professions are more effective when they work together as a team because they have multiple perspectives from which to collect information.

Interprofessional Simulation and Education: Physical Therapy, Nursing, and Theatre Faculty Work Together to Develop a Standardized Patient Program.

A well-conceived training program for standardized patients (SPs) can increase their effectiveness in portraying actual patients This article describes the development of an SP program that allows graduate and undergraduate students to engage in interprofessional experiences in a multifunctional simulation center. Three academic programs at a midwestern university developed an interdisciplinary course that trains undergraduate students as SPs for nursing and physical therapy simulation experiences. The SP program has opened doors for interprofessional collaboration beyond current simulation experiences and has exposed the university community to simulation.