Formative peer assessment in higher healthcare education programmes: a scoping review

Supporting each other towards independence: A narrative analysis of first-year nursing students' collaborative process

Collaboration for nursing is a core competence and therefore educational interventions are essentials for collaborative skills. To identify such interventions, we carried out a study to understand nursing students' collaborative process. A narrative inquiry method was used to explore the collaborative process of first-year undergraduate nursing students. The analysis was conducted on field notes from 70 h of observation of 87 nursing students' collaboration during skills lab activities. It also included transcriptions of four focus group discussions with 11 students. The results are presented as a sequential process of (1) navigating in unfamiliar territory, (2) navigating together to cope, and (3) navigating together towards independency and the future nursing profession. We identified a transition from teacher-led assistance and guidance to student interdependency and reciprocal learning, ending with student-led assistance supporting independency. In line with Vygotsky's theory of zone of proximal development, different scaffolding interventions are needed depending on where the students are in the collaborative process.

Development of hidden curriculum skills in a COVID-19 vaccination centre

BACKGROUND

During the COVID-19 pandemic, many medical students were deployed as vaccinators. This study set out to capture the lived experience of students at a London-based mass vaccination site, understand what they learned, how this learning compared to their experience of usual medical education and how any identified benefits might be leveraged in a post-pandemic context.

METHODS

Student vaccinators (n = 8) were recruited from the vaccine clinic workforce and invited to complete semi-structured interviews about their experiences. Thematic analysis was conducted on interview transcripts to identify significant concepts, which were interpreted in the context of available literature.

FINDINGS

Participants' experiences aligned broadly with the undergraduate curriculum. However, many also identified hidden curriculum areas developed through their work as vaccinators, including professionalism, self-regulating learning and ethical decision-making.

DISCUSSION

The need for adequate support, whilst promoting autonomy, was highlighted as vital in supporting professional identity formation within a community of practice, benchmarking clinical knowledge and performance, and in support of student wellbeing, in the face of challenging real-world clinical encounters.

CONCLUSION

Increased entrustment of clinical activity could be implemented in primary and secondary care settings to reproduce the benefits experienced by student vaccinators in front-line roles during the COVID-19 pandemic. Further work might consider how to maximise these benefits and increase inclusion and participation.

Innovative Tele-Instruction Approach Impacts Basic Life Support Performance: A Non-inferiority Trial

Background

Sustaining Basic Life Support (BLS) training during the COVID-19 pandemic bears substantial challenges. The limited availability of highly qualified instructors and tight economic conditions complicates the delivery of these life-saving trainings. Consequently, innovative and resource-efficient approaches are needed to minimize or eliminate contagion while maintaining high training standards and managing learner anxiety related to infection risk.

Methods

In a non-inferiority trial 346 first-year medical, dentistry, and physiotherapy students underwent BLS training at AIXTRA—Competence Center for Training and Patient Safety at the University Hospital RWTH Aachen. Our objectives were (1) to examine whether peer feedback BLS training supported by tele-instructors matches the learning performance of standard instructor-guided BLS training for laypersons; and (2) to minimize infection risk during BLS training. Therefore, in a parallel group design, we compared arm (1) Standard Instructor Feedback (SIF) BLS training (Historical control group of 2019) with arm (2) a Tele-Instructor Supported Peer-Feedback (TPF) BLS training (Intervention group of 2020). Both study arms were based on Peyton's 4-step approach. Before and after each training session, objective data for BLS performance (compression depth and rate) were recorded using a resuscitation manikin. We also assessed overall BLS performance via standardized instructor evaluation and student self-reports of confidence via questionnaire. Non-inferiority margins for the outcome parameters and sample size calculation were based on previous studies with SIF. Two-sided 95% confidence intervals were employed to determine significance of non-inferiority.

Results

The results confirmed non-inferiority of TPF to SIF for all tested outcome parameters. A follow-up after 2 weeks found no confirmed COVID-19 infections among the participants.

Conclusion

Tele-instructor supported peer feedback is a powerful alternative to in-person instructor feedback on BLS skills during a pandemic, where infection risk needs to be minimized while maximizing the quality of BLS skill learning.

Trial registration

https://www.drks.de/drks_web/navigate.do?navigationId=trial.HTML&TRIAL_ID=DRKS00025199, Trial ID: DRKS00025199.