Integrating Climate Change in the Curriculum: Using Instructional Design Methods to Create an Educational Innovation for Nurse Practitioners in a Doctor of Nursing Practice Program

An applied epidemiology course for doctor of nursing practice students was revised to include a module on the impact of climate change on population health. The Analyze, Design, Develop, Implement, and Evaluate (ADDIE) model of instructional design is a gold standard framework for creating course content and guided the module development. A nurse content expert discussed the environmental impacts of climate change on health using literature, actual clinical scenarios, and the application of epidemiologic data. Topics included safeguarding workers and vulnerable populations within the context of the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic. Students posted reflections on their understanding of module content in response to structured prompts electronically in the learning management system for review by the faculty. Faculty evaluation of responses identified the need to further develop and integrate environmental epidemiology and climate change content more fully within the doctor of nursing practice curriculum.

How clinicians manage routinely low supplies of personal protective equipment.

BACKGROUND: Recommended personal protective equipment (PPE) is routinely limited or unavailable in low-income countries, but there is limited research as to how clinicians adapt to that scarcity, despite the implications for patients and workers. METHODS: This is a qualitative secondary analysis of case study data collected in Liberia in 2019. Data from the parent study were included in this analysis if it addressed availability and use of PPE in the clinical setting. Conventional content analysis was used on data including: field notes documenting nurse practice, semi-structured interview transcripts, and photographs. RESULTS: Data from the majority of participants (32/37) and all facilities (12/12) in the parent studies were included. Eighty-three percent of facilities reported limited PPE. Five management strategies for coping with limited PPE supplies were observed, reported, or both: rationing PPE, self-purchasing PPE, asking patients to purchase PPE, substituting PPE, and working without PPE. Approaches to rationing PPE included using PPE only for symptomatic patients or not performing physical exams. Substitutions for PPE were based on supply availability. CONCLUSIONS: Strategies developed by clinicians to manage low PPE likely have negative consequences for both workers and patients; further research into the topic is important, as is better PPE provision in low-income countries.

Nurse Educators as Agents of Change in the SARS-CoV-2 Pandemic.

The coronavirus pandemic caused a rapid and seismic shift in the provision of nursing education. In this commentary, I provide examples of how faculty and students at my university made the shift and what we have learned from the experience thus far.