Nursing School Journal of Nursing

Improving the Clinical Experience of Working with Undergraduate Nursing Students: A Team Approach

Improving the Clinical Experience of Working with Undergraduate Nursing Students: A Team Approach

Tags: clinical clinical experience nursing school nursing students preceptorship student nurse students teamwork undergraduate working together

This article emphasizes the value of working together in training the future nurses, and suggests strategies and tools to assist in the process. Bringing quality and safety to nursing education in the classroom and clinical is of high importance. Staff nurses play a key role in the clinical preparation and success of the student nurse. Faculty, preceptors, students and the system at large can be more successful if working together to reach the learning objectives and goals. Designated educational units (DEU) are an example of improved clinical teaching/learning environments, but every clinical unit can participate and practice quality regardless to the formal structure and protocal of an established DEU. Understanding that the staff nurse plays a significant role in mentoring the future nurse generation is a reason enough to see working with students is a necessity rather than a burden.

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"Just a nurse"

Tags: helping nurse nursing school outside the box

Being a nurse is sufficient...think outside of the box

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Do Nurses Need Biology?

Do Nurses Need Biology?

Tags: biology nursing school requirements

As Biology instructors for nursing students, it is an honour to contribute to laying down a foundation in Biology for future nurses. One common question that has emerged among nursing students is “Why do I need to know Biology if I’m going to become a nurse?” We have wrestled with this question for some time. How does one generate an appropriate response to this question? How does one instill within a student the passion for learning Biology? How can one emphasize how valuable understanding Biology will become in the workplace? We hope to raise some interesting discussion and awareness about a topic that we have spent countless hours deliberating amongst ourselves and our colleagues.

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The Future of Nursing Education: Heading for a Major Crisis

The Future of Nursing Education: Heading for a Major Crisis

Tags: advanced practice advocate clinical experience future of nursing history of nursing nursing education nursing faculty nursing leadership nursing school requirements undergraduate

Nursing as a practice and profession has experienced significant changes over the years. For instance, in the 1800s nurses were expected to be subservient to doctors. Just hear what the doctor who gave Springfield Hospital’s first nursing graduation address: "Every nurse must remember that it is the attending physician's business to make a diagnosis of disease and hence that she should never hazard an opinion herself, under any circumstances." (Dr. Hooker, Springfield Hospital Annual Report, 1894). It would be interesting to know what the nursing faculty were thinking when they heard those words. Thankfully nurses during that era did not take the doctor’s advice and remained dedicated to advance and advocate for the profession of nursing. Around the same time that Springfield Hospital’s first nursing graduating class were listening to their graduation address, Florence Nightingale along with other nurse advocates, were making incredible strides to implement nursing education. After the Crimean War, Florence Nightingale recognized and introduced the need for formal nursing education but the education was limited to basic nursing knowledge and skills. As a result of the Women’s Rights Movement in the 1900s, the idea of nursing as a profession evolved into a reality. As society’s healthcare needs changed, nursing education had to change to meet those needs. There were however, challenges each century faced when trying to ensure nursing education met society’s needs and today, the challenges faced are heading right for a major crisis.

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It is Time to Recruit More Men into the Profession of Nursing

It is Time to Recruit More Men into the Profession of Nursing

Tags: history of nursing male nurse men nursing school profession recruiting

It is a benefit to have men working in the profession of nursing. We need to recruit more men into our nursing schools and to work in our healthcare institutions. Both male and female nurses bring different perspectives and benefits to the profession of nursing and to the patient’s they care for. The ability of men to negotiate and obtain higher salaries and positions in both administration and nursing specialty areas may serve as the impetus to elevate the entire nursing profession.

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Nursing School Angel

Nursing School Angel

Tags: acceptance death lessons life nursing school

How a patient in nursing school taught me how to deal with life and death

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Improving Patient Care While Decreasing Costs: The Benefits, Barriers, and Student Perspectives on Nurse Residency Programs

Improving Patient Care While Decreasing Costs: The Benefits, Barriers, and Student Perspectives on Nurse Residency Programs

Tags: decreasing costs Floating graduates improving patient care new graduate nurses nursing nursing school nursing students patient care student perspectives violence

Many professions have long since realized that a vast divide exists between the classroom and real-world practice and, thus, have mandated transitional programs. Nursing lacks such an intermediate step as part of its professional training although new nurses are pressured to provide both safe and competent care to increasingly complex patients without any transitional support. To fill this gap many institutions have begun to implement their own nurse-residency programs [NRPs]. However, since not all institutions have introduced such transition-into-practice programs barriers must exist. Nationwide, NRPs are shrouded in confusion, false perceptions, and concerns that hinder their implementation. This manuscript was compiled to help shed light onto the reasons for the lack of implementation and provides evidence of the importance and overall benefits for such programs. Personal perspectives are also provided from the authors in order to gain a nursing-student perspective about these transitional programs.

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The Birmingham VA Nursing Academy Partnership

The Birmingham VA Nursing Academy Partnership

Tags: education medical technology nursing academy nursing education nursing partnership nursing school partnership students veterans veterans affairs

This article describes a partnership and the importance of partnering with the Birmingham VA Medical Center and the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Nursing as part of a pilot program in The United States to promote nursing careers in the VA hospital and to improve the quality of nursing education in the School of Nursing. Since it began, in 2009, this program, called the Veterans Affairs Nursing Academy Partnership, has consistently performed beyond expectations to increase the breadth of knowledge for a select group of baccalaureate nursing students. Further it has created a strong connection between the Birmingham VA Medical Center and the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Nursing, a professional resource that benefits all students and faculty.

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Remember When We Were Nursing Students

Remember When We Were Nursing Students

Tags: clinical clinical rotations nursing school nursing students stress student students violence

I remember, as most nurses can, their days in nursing school, feeling anxious and scared going to clinical rotations to take care of real living patients and not just the mannequins in the lab. Most us can also recall how the floor nurses treated us as students engrossed in our clinical rotations. There were nurses who made a positive impression on us and unfortunately there were nurses who did not make a positive impression. Terms such as “Incivility”, “Bullying”, “Vertical Violence” and “Internal Violence” have become too familiar in today’s nursing literature. As an Associate Professor of Nursing, it is a shame to have to include such terms in nursing lectures and worse of all trying to explain reasons this may be happening among nurses and just may happen to them as nursing students. According to Luparell (2011) “Because today’s student are tomorrow’s colleagues, conversations regarding incivility and bullying should include specific aspects of nursing academia and the preparation of new nurses”.

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Nursing Summer Camp: Recruiting the Next Generation of Nurses!

Nursing Summer Camp: Recruiting the Next Generation of Nurses!

Tags: camp care child children nursing nursing school team building

This manuscript looks at providing a nursing summer camp to school aged children with the hopes of sparking interest in the profession at a young age, as well as fostering the nursing spirit in children who may be considering the profession.

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