Abstract
Effective nursing education is crucial for the increasing complex care needed in healthcare settings. Academic-practice partnerships are established through collaboration of university and healthcare institutions to address the shortage of faculty and nurses. The Dedicated Education Unit (DEU) model is used to train staff nurses to become preceptors while providing increased individualized learning opportunities for students. The DEU first originated in Australia in the twentieth century and since then has been implemented internationally including the United States. Students in the DEU receive ample exposure to patient care while working in a one- on-one clinical approach with a preceptor. The nursing faculty oversees the clinical experience and serves as the clinical coach in the DEU. Nurse preceptors are equipped with learning resources to help students integrate classroom education into nursing practice. Hence, the DEU increases teaching capacity by allowing trained preceptors to become clinical teachers at the bedside while maintaining the quality of nursing education for students. The aim of this study was to gain insights into the perceived effectiveness of the DEU clinical model through self-reports of the learning experience among students and preceptors. A pilot study was conducted in Spring 2022 to investigate the learning experiences of 22 second semester baccalaureate students and 14 nurse preceptors sin the DEU clinical. Approval for the study was obtained from the university institutional review board and two affiliated hospitals located in Southern California. Participants completed an online survey after signing consent in Qualtrics. The Student Clinical Learning Culture (SCLC) and Support Instrument for Nurses Facilitating the Learning of Others (SINFLO) surveys were used to examine the perceived learning experiences of students and preceptors, respectively. Based on one-sided twosample t-tests, student motivation, social inclusion, and preceptor preparation subscales had means that were significantly higher than a similar study (Williams et al. 2021). Having increased one-on- one learning with a trained DEU preceptor thus facilitates student preparation for nursing practice. Findings of the study cannot be generalized to other settings and causal inferences cannot be determined based on the small sample size. However, this study provides a better understanding of student motivation, social inclusion and preceptor preparation in the DEU clinical. As the DEU continues to expand across the United States, future studies can build on results of this pilot study by implementing student motivation and social inclusion strategies in future preceptor preparation programs.
What will the audience take away from your presentation?
Explain how the audience will be able to use what they learn?
At the end of this presentation, attendees will be able to
Provide a brief history of the dedicated education unit
Describe how the dedicated education unit can be implemented to combat the faculty and nursing shortage * Explain how the one-on-one dedicated education unit model provides increased learning opportunities through exposure to complex patient situations
How will this help the audience in their job? Is this research that other faculty could use to expand their research or teaching? Does this provide a practical solution to a problem that could simplify or make a designer’s job more efficient? Will it improve the accuracy of a design, or provide new information to assist in a design problem? List all other benefits.
Through heightened awareness, audience can benefit their organization by incorporating the Dedicated Education Unit model as a potential solution for the current faculty/nursing shortage to benefit their organization * Others can replicate the study using a larger sample size to investigate the effectiveness of the model in their area of practice
Survey instruments may be adapted to examine the effectiveness of the model
Future preceptor programs already in place can implement the Dedicated Education Unit model to compensate for the shortage of nursing faculty
Students can gain experience in practice like on-the-job training on the unit and be prepared to enter the workforce if hired upon graduation by the healthcare institution.