A Systematic Review of Global Health Assessment for Education in Healthcare Professions

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Finding the right balance: student perceptions of using virtual simulation as a community placement

OBJECTIVES

Finding appropriate community clinical placements has been challenging in recent years, most especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. During the 2020-2021 semesters, a university in the province of Alberta, Canada chose to use the community health virtual simulation program, Sentinel City®3.1, to provide clinical placements for three groups of undergraduate students. This expository paper, co-authored by students and faculty, sought to further explore how virtual simulation can be used to best support student learning by identifying practices that students find most helpful.

METHOD

Jeffries' (2005) simulation framework was used to guide a quality improvement analysis which explored feedback received from 16 students regarding the use of Sentinel City®3.1 as a clinical placement, with additional contributions from the student co-authors.

RESULTS

Students felt Sentinel City®3.1 was an effective tool to learn community and population health concepts, however, all students indicated that they would have preferred more opportunities to work with real communities.

CONCLUSION

Virtual simulation programs like Sentinel City®3.1 might be best as a learning supplement rather than as students' sole clinical placement experience.

Cultural Competence and Cultural Sensitivity Education in University Nursing Courses. A Scoping Review

When assessing the fragility that characterizes the health of an immigrant person, a culturally competent transformation of the nurse-patient teaching-learning process is necessary. Therefore, it is considered essential to incorporate cultural competence and intercultural communication in higher nursing education.

OBJECTIVE

To determine the content and knowledge of cultural competence and intercultural communication offered in higher education in nursing courses.

DESIGN

The Campinha-Bacote model of cultural competence was used as the primary reference.

METHOD

A scoping review was conducted about studies published in the period 2003 and 2020. The research was conducted between May and October 2020. More than a hundred documents (books, chapters, articles, conference proceedings) have been consulted.

RESULTS

Undergraduate nursing courses and postgraduate education move toward promoting cultural competence and sensitivity through teaching strategies.

CONCLUSIONS

Teaching projects that combine multiple competencies are more effective, including teacher training. A predominant element is a need for continuous and transversal projects. University nursing education must adapt culturally competent curricula.

Gett'n on the bus: evaluation of Sentinel City®3.0 virtual simulation in community/population health clinical placement

Objectives The purpose of this project was to implement and evaluate the integration of a computer-based virtual simulation program into a community clinical course as an alternative or complement to conventional clinical with agencies or neighbourhoods. Securing quality community health clinical opportunities for undergraduate nursing students remains challenging. In addition, evidence of a theory-practice gap in community clinical education, particularly in non-traditional settings, suggests that nurse educators need to adopt different pedagogies to ensure that students will gain competencies necessary to practice community/population health nursing. In response, we piloted the use of Sentinel City®3.0, a virtual reality simulation program. Method A 5-point Likert-style questionnaire was administered to students randomly assigned to different clinical placements. Results Results indicated that there were no learning outcomes in which students in Sentinel City®3.0 reported percentages lower than students in agencies or geographical neighbourhoods. When there were statistically significant differences, students engaged in Sentinel City®3.0 performed better than students in other experiences. Conclusion We recommend further exploration of multi-contextual pedagogies for community clinical.

Reshaping curricula: Culture and mental health in undergraduate health degrees

Australia is a country rich in cultural diversity, with Indigenous Australians having specific cultural values and a variety of spoken languages. In addition, the increasing number of people from migrant and refugee backgrounds requires that health professionals be able to communicate effectively with people from a wide range of cultural backgrounds. This is particularly relevant when undertaking a mental health assessment, because members of diverse communities often face the dual vulnerability of marginalization and stigmatization. This paper reports on the development and evaluation of a virtual teaching and learning resource that prepares health students to be culturally competent in mental health assessment. Four online interprofessional learning journeys were developed. Evaluation of the learning resources was conducted across three participating Australian universities. Quantitative evaluation involved pre- and post-testing using an empathy scale, the Mental Health Nursing Clinical Confidence Scale, and the Cultural Competence Questionnaire informed by the theory of planned behaviour. Qualitative data from focus group interviews explored participants' experiences of using the guided learning journey. Participants reported changes from pretest to post-test in their empathy and attitudes towards culturally and linguistically diverse consumers with significant positive changes in cultural competence, empathy, and attitudes. There was strong satisfaction with the learning materials, indicating that participants valued this 'real world' learning experience. Results require cautious interpretation, given recruitment difficulties in the evaluation phase. However, these learning journeys appear to have potential to be an effective way to challenge attitudes and perceptions, as well as increase cultural competence towards culturally and linguistically diverse consumers.

The Cultural Competence of Graduating Nursing Students

Purpose: Cultural competence is an essential component in nursing. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the level of cultural competence of graduating nursing students, to identify associated background factors to cultural competence, and furthermore to establish whether teaching multicultural nursing was implemented in nursing education. Design: A structured Cultural Competence Assessment Tool was used in a correlational design with a sample of 295 nursing students in southern Finland. Findings and Conclusions: The level of cultural competence was moderate, and the majority of students had studied multicultural nursing. Minority background ( p = .001), frequency of interacting with different cultures ( p = .002), linguistic skills ( p = .002), and exchange studies ( p = .024) were positively associated to higher cultural competence. Implications for Practice: To improve cultural competence in students, nursing education should provide continuous opportunities for students to interact with different cultures, develop linguistic skills, and provide possibilities for internationalization both at home and abroad.

Development and psychometric testing of the satisfaction with Cultural Simulation Experience Scale

Decreasing the numbers of adverse health events experienced by people from culturally diverse backgrounds rests, in part, on the ability of education providers to provide quality learning experiences that support nursing students in developing cultural competence, an essential professional attribute. This paper reports on the implementation and evaluation of an immersive 3D cultural empathy simulation. The Satisfaction with Cultural Simulation Experience Scale used in this study was adapted and validated as the first stage of this study. Exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis were undertaken to investigate the psychometric properties of the scale using two randomly-split sub-samples. Cronbach's Alpha was used to examine internal consistency reliability. Descriptive statistics were used for analysis of mean satisfaction scores and qualitative comments to open-ended questions were analysed and coded. A purposive sample (n = 497) of second of nursing students participated in the study. The overall Cronbach's alpha for the scale was 0.95 and each subscale demonstrated high internal consistency: 0.92; 0.92; 0.72 respectively. The mean satisfaction score was 4.64 (SD 0.51) out of a maximum of 5 indicating a high level of participant satisfaction with the simulation. Three factors emerged from qualitative analysis: "Becoming culturally competent", "Learning from the debrief" and "Reflecting on practice". The cultural simulation was highly regarded by students. Psychometric testing of the Satisfaction with Cultural Simulation Experience Scale demonstrated that it is a reliable instrument. However, there is room for improvement and further testing in other contexts is therefore recommended.

The perceived benefits of a virtual community: effects of learning style, race, ethnicity, and frequency of use on nursing students

BACKGROUND

It is important for nursing faculty to consider the variability in learning style among nursing students.

AIM

The researchers sought to compare differences in perceived learning benefits among nursing students who had different learning styles and in frequency of use of a virtual community learning intervention. METHOD Using a comparative approach, learning style was measured with the Kolb Learning Style Inventory. Frequency of use and benefit were measured with an exit survey.

RESULTS

No differences in perceived benefit were found according to learning style. Subjects with frequent use of the virtual community reported significantly greater learning benefits than those with infrequent use, regardless of learning style. Also found was a statistically significant relationship between Kolb learning-style scores and race or ethnicity.

CONCLUSION

All nursing students may potentially benefit from virtual community use.

Lessons learned in multisite, nursing education research while studying a technology learning innovation

Multiple challenges must be addressed when educational research is being conducted that involves a teaching innovation at multiple sites over time, including the consistent adoption and use of the intervention, attrition, response rates, and other aspects related to managing a complex study. After an 18-month nursing education study was conducted at multiple institutions across the United States, the authors' study team reflected on strategies that worked well, the challenges faced, and what could have been done differently. This article details the challenges and offers recommendations for other researchers conducting similar studies. Recommendations related to communication and engagement, innovation fidelity, survey fatigue, multiple institutional review board applications, and flexibility are provided.