Baccalaureate nursing students' knowledge, attitudes, educational needs, and use of medical and non-medical cannabis at five institutions in Manitoba, Canada: A cross-sectional analysis.

BACKGROUND: With the legalization of non-medical cannabis in Canada, cannabis is commonly used in the community and nurses and nursing students are likely to engage in clinical practice discussions around cannabis use for both medical and non-medical purposes. However, whether having previous experience using cannabis influences nursing students' knowledge and attitudes towards cannabis remains unclear. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to describe nursing students' knowledge, attitudes, educational needs, and use of cannabis. DESIGN: Cross-sectional survey. SETTING: Five academic undergraduate nursing programs in Manitoba, Canada. PARTICIPANTS: Nursing students in Manitoba. METHODS: Students were asked about their use of cannabis, knowledge and attitudes regarding cannabis, clinical experiences and educational needs related to cannabis. Students' current knowledge was compared to their desired knowledge using paired t-tests. Using t-tests, attitudes towards cannabis were compared between students who had ever taken cannabis versus those with no experience. Descriptive statistics were utilized for all other questions. RESULTS: A total of 327 nursing students participated in the survey with 220 students (67.3 %) reporting they had used cannabis in the past, and 123 students (37.6 %) reporting monthly use of cannabis. Students who previously used cannabis held more positive attitudes towards both medical and non-medical cannabis use in comparison to those with no experience. Students recognised that their current knowledge around cannabis was insufficient and indicated the need for greater knowledge on both medical and non-medical cannabis-related topics. Only 37.7 % of students reported receiving any education on cannabis in their nursing program. Nearly all students (92.2 %) agreed if they had more education on medical cannabis use that they would feel more comfortable discussing this in their clinical practice. CONCLUSION: Education on both medical and non-medical cannabis is needed to support future nurses addressing cannabis use in their clinical practice. Nursing institutions must implement and evaluate curricula to ensure nursing students are adequately prepared to address cannabis use in their clinical practice and their own fitness to practice.

Writing self-efficacy in nursing students: The influence of a discipline-specific writing environment.

AIM: To explore if writing self-efficacy improved among first-year nursing students in the context of discipline-specific writing. The relationship between writing self-efficacy, anxiety and student grades are also explored with respect to various learner characteristics such as postsecondary experience, writing history, English as a second language status and online versus classroom instruction. DESIGN: A one group quasi-experimental study with a time control period. METHOD: Data was collected over the 2013-2014 academic year at orientation, start of writing course and end of writing course. RESULTS: Writing self-efficacy improved from pre- to post writing course but remained stable during the time control period. Anxiety was negatively related to writing self-efficacy but remained stable across the study period. Inexperienced students and students with less writing experience, appeared to over-inflate their self-assessed writing self-efficacy early in the programme. This study gives promising evidence that online and classroom delivery of instruction are both feasible for introducing discipline specific writing.

Seizure onset times for rats receiving systemic lithium and pilocarpine: sources of variability.

Injection of 30 mg/kg of pilocarpine 24 h after systemic injection of lithium (3 mEq/kg) results in overt limbic motor seizures within about 30 min. Results of several experiments indicated that whereas food deprivation or repeated nociceptive stimulation during the previous 24 h decreased seizure onset times (SOTs) by about 11 to 12 min, food restriction, continuous lighting, or, handling during the previous 7 to 14 days increased SOTs by comparable durations. Early handling before weaning but not injections of clomimpramine also decreased SOTs. A difference of 18 min in the means of SOTs was produced by injecting either 1.0 (increased SOT) or 1.5 mg/kg (decreased SOT) of dexamethasome during the previous 24 h. A strong (multiple r=.87) association between SOTs and the amount of damage within five specific thalamic-limbic nuclei was observed. These results, in conjunction with blood corticosterone levels taken before and after induction of the seizures, suggest the neurochemical mechanisms affecting the range in SOTs could involve the adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH)-corticosterone system and influence the amount of post-seizure-induced damage.