RESUMO
With the increasing need for competent nurses specializing in acute and critical care, educators must consider the needs and preferences of students in designing experiential learning programs. This cross-sectional, choice-based conjoint analysis determined the acute and critical care experiential learning preferences of student nurses. From March to July 2016, 213 randomly-selected student nurses from a higher education institution in Manila, Philippines were surveyed and ranked 20 choice bundles with 5 selected attributes of the experiential learning program. Results showed that duration of unit exposure (48.73%) and group structure (7.46%) were the most and least valued attributes, respectively. Additionally, student nurses prefer an experiential learning program that lasts for 1 week (21â¯h) per unit (utilityâ¯=â¯0.93), has a stay-in instructor (utilityâ¯=â¯0.30), encourages full student involvement (utilityâ¯=â¯1.08), deploys 2-3 students per group (utilityâ¯=â¯0.09), and provides both single program and on-going unit orientation (utilityâ¯=â¯0.52). Part-worth utilities of duration of unit exposure (tâ¯=â¯3.65, pâ¯=â¯0.0001) and group structure (tâ¯=â¯3.46, pâ¯=â¯0.001) differed between gender. With a model explaining the acute and critical care experiential learning preferences of student nurses, nursing institutions can restructure their clinical placement to maximize positive learning.