Lisa R Green
Carroll University, USA
Title: Nursing and physical therapy student’s attitudes and perceptions following an interprofessional simulation experience
Biography
Biography: Lisa R Green
Abstract
Purpose: Interprofessional education (IPE) has a goal to help improve the patient experience, improve health, and reduce the cost of health care. Therefore, building IPE into simulations allows students from different disciplines to learn more about roles and responsibilities, values/ethics, teamwork, and communication. In nursing curricula, it is difficult to involve students in interprofessional activity in the clinical setting, so a learning activity was implemented to give nursing students the opportunity to communicate with another profession.
Methodology: A quasi-experimental pretest/post-test design was conducted to explore the effects of an interprofessional simulation experience on nursing students’ attitudes, knowledge, and communication skills. Surveys were administered to all participants on week prior to the interprofessional simulation experience and again after the completion of the simulation experience and debriefing. The surveys included Student Satisfaction and Self-Confidence in Learning (SS&SCL) and the Readiness for Interprofessional Learning Scale (RIPLS). Paired T-tests were used to analyse survey results.
Findings: Results indicated that nursing students demonstrated significant differences when comparing pretests to post-tests in both surveys. The SS & SCL indicated a significant increase in attitudes about the instruction student received following the simulation activity. The RIPLS survey had significantly higher scores for the post-tests in areas concerning shared learning with other health care students which increased student’s understanding of clinical problems and made them think more positively about other professionals. Ultimately the students indicated that this IPE experience would benefit patients if health-care students worked together to solve patient problems.
Conclusion: The use of collaborative IPE within nursing curricula will aide students in developing an understanding of the roles, responsibilities, values/ethics, teamwork, and effective communication with should be continued to aid in understanding of other professions. Nursing students’ perceptions of IPE significantly improved following participation in an interprofessional simulation experience.