Shifting Strategies: Using Film to Improve Therapeutic Communication and Nursing Education.

Narrative pedagogy successfully transformed a previously discordant mental health clinical rotation into a reflective and engaged learning process. Use of the film "Wit" early in the clinical semester was popular with subsequent cohorts of students and helped better engage them in practicing therapeutic communication techniques. This article is an exemplar of the application of narrative pedagogy as a means of embracing the phenomenon of therapeutic communication in health care.

Evaluation of an instrument to measure nurses' familiarity with emergency preparedness.

UNLABELLED: The events of September 11, 2001, and the 2005 devastation of Hurricane Katrina have emphasized the importance of educating all nurses in emergency preparedness and bioterrorism. METHODS: Further evaluation (secondary data analysis) of the Emergency Preparedness Information Questionnaire (EPIQ) was conducted, to assess nurses familiarity with emergency preparedness. RESULTS: This study confirmed that the EPIQ, as revised, has sound psychometric characteristics (construct validity and internal reliability) as a tool to measure nurses' self-reported level of familiarity with emergency preparedness. CONCLUSIONS: Additional studies using the revised EPIQ should provide data to assist civilian and military nurse educators and to facilitate the development of competency-based, relevant, emergency preparedness curricula.

The Use of Simulation to Teach Nursing Students and Clinicians Palliative Care and End-of-Life Communication: A Systematic Review.

OBJECTIVES: To present the findings of a systematic review on the use of simulation-based learning experiences (SBLEs) to teach communication skills to nursing students and clinicians who provide palliative and end-of-life care to patients and their families. BACKGROUND: Palliative care communication skills are fundamental to providing holistic patient care. Since nurses have the greatest amount of direct exposure to patients, building such communication competencies is essential. However, exposure to patients and families receiving palliative and end-of-life care is often limited, resulting in few opportunities to learn these skills in the clinical setting. Simulation-based learning experiences can be used to supplement didactic teaching and clinical experiences to build the requisite communication skills. METHODS: Searches of CINAHL, MEDLINE, PsychINFO, ERIC, and Web of Science electronic databases and Grey Literature returned 442 unique records. Thirty articles met the established criteria, including the SBLE must contain a nursing role. RESULTS: Simulation-based learning experience are being used to teach palliative and end-of-life communication skills to nursing students and clinicians. Lack of standardization, poor evaluation methods, and limited exposure to the entire interprofessional team makes it difficult to identify and disseminate validated best practices. CONCLUSION: While the need for further research is acknowledged, we recommend this evidence be augmented by training programs that utilize SBLEs through (1) applying standards, (2) clearly specifying goals and objectives, (3) integrating externally validated scenarios, and (4) employing rigorous evaluation methods and measures that link the SBLE to the training objectives and desired clinician practice behaviors and patient outcomes.

The use of high-fidelity simulation to teach cultural competence in the nursing curriculum.

The United States population is undergoing a major demographic shift, by the year 2050, it is predicted that minority populations will constitute half of the general population. This evolving population change is significant due to the overwhelming burden of disease that minorities face in the nation. Cultural competence training is currently being used to prepare practitioners to provide care to a diverse population in an effort to eliminate health disparities. With the increasing demands of the nursing curriculum and the limited time frame to prepare competent clinicians, the search continues for innovative strategies that will produce culturally competent providers. Patient simulation is a technique that replicates real-world scenarios in a controlled and nonthreatening environment. However, despite the legal and moral obligations that nurses have to provide culturally competent care, a lack of evidence exists regarding how to properly integrate simulation methods for cultural competence training into the nursing curriculum. In the nursing curriculum, patient simulation has been used mainly to teach the biomedical aspects of care with less focus on the psychological, cultural, and environmental context. The potential exists for the use of high-fidelity patient simulation as an effective teaching strategy for cultural competence training.

The doctor of nursing practice and nursing education: highlights, potential, and promise.

The success of the doctor of nursing practice (DNP) programs have exceeded everyone's expectations and resulted in increased interest in doctoral education in nursing. A shortage of doctorally prepared nurse educators continues to plague the profession and has a severe impact on the ability of schools of nursing to educate future generations of nurses. As a terminal degree in nursing practice, there is little focus on DNP graduates who are prepared as educators. To remedy this deficit, this article will therefore discuss and highlight (a) the significant potential of the DNP to mitigate the current nursing faculty shortage and to close the practice-education gap, (b) the specialized role of DNP graduates as educators and leaders in nursing education, and (c) the implications of the DNP for nursing scholarship.