High-Fidelity Simulation in an Undergraduate Ambulatory Care Nursing Course

For a new ambulatory care nursing course in an undergraduate baccalaureate program, a standardized patient simulation was created to support the clinical component of the course. The goals were for students to enhance their critical thinking skills, apply the nursing process to an ambulatory setting, apply learned skills to the non-acute care setting, and increase their confidence. The simulation format included three stations: skills refresher, telehealth, and clinic. Volunteers from faculty, clinical preceptors, and nursing management acted as clients for the mock clinical settings. Feedback was positive and supported this simulation as an educational option.

Ambulatory care education: Preparing nurses for the future of healthcare

In the current healthcare environment, ambulatory care nursing is increasingly recognized as an efficient and effective way of collaborating with clients to improve health outcomes and to focus on prevention. Nursing skills in ambulatory care are both valuable and necessary. However, few undergraduate nursing programs provide content on ambulatory care or significant clinical experience outside the context of an acute care setting. To meet this gap in education, a baccalaureate undergraduate course in ambulatory care nursing was created to address the growing need for RNs in this field. In collaboration with affiliated healthcare systems, this course provides the knowledge and skills needed to enable new RNs to enter this challenging and rapidly changing specialty.