Addressing the Shortage of Academic Nurse Educators: Recommendations for Educational Institutions Based on Nominal Group Technique Research.

AIM: The purpose of this qualitative study was twofold: 1) explore factors contributing to the shortage of academic nurse educators (ANEs) and 2) identify opportunities to address these factors from the perspectives of nursing education institutions. BACKGROUND: The nurse faculty shortage is a major national concern, with inadequate recruitment and retention. Addressing the nursing faculty shortage is important to maintain a sustained nursing workforce. METHOD: Using a nominal group technique (NGT), a group of 45 diverse nurse educators from across the United States formed a virtual workgroup. RESULTS: Findings led to an action plan formulated to guide educational institutions with ways to decrease the ANE shortage through recruitment and retention. CONCLUSION: The evidence demonstrates the need for educational institutions to concentrate efforts on recruiting and retaining ANEs to combat the nursing shortage. The analysis offers recommendations to institutions to increase the number of qualified ANEs.

Standardized handoff report form in clinical nursing education: An educational tool for patient safety and quality of care.

Effective change-of-shift handoff communication is a core competency in the generalist education of nurses. The use of a standardized handoff tool that fosters higher order thinking and clinical reasoning is fundamental in clinical education and nursing practice (AACN, 2008). A checklist that prompts students to implement evidence-based safety alerts will increase students' confidence and autonomy, prevent errors, promote patient safety, and successfully transform theoretical learning into competent practice. High-quality handoffs and contextualized post-conference debriefing using key items in the handoff form will help increase students' feelings of precision, accuracy, improve their self-image, and enhance their sense of professional belonging.

Safety culture and safety attitudes of nurses in the National University Hospital

PURPOSE: Patient safety issues pose a great burden worldwide. However, there is still inadequate data on the burden of Patient Safety issues in the Philippines to specifically address institutional and national concerns through directed program, policies, and interventions. This current study aims to describe the safety culture and attitudes of nurses of the National University Hospital in Manila, Philippines.DESIGN: This study used non-experimental design that assessed the safety culture and safety attitudes of nurses from the general units of the National University Hospital (NUH) using two assessment tools: the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture (AHRQ-HSOPS) and the Safety Attitudes Questionnaire- Short Form (SAQ). Ethical approval was granted from both the university and the hospital ethics review boards. METHODS: Stratified random sampling was used to ensure representation of staff nurses and nurse administrators. A self-administered survey that included the two tools was translated to Filipino and administered to 200 nurses. Percent of positive responses were obtained to describe the safety culture and attitudes as prescribed by toolkits of AHRQ-HSOPS and SAQ.FINDINGS: The overall survey response rate yielded 86.77%. Nurses from the National University Hospital displayed both positive Safety Culture and Safety Attitudes based on AHRQ-HSOPS and SAQ. Dimensions that garnered the highest positive perceptions in Safety Culture were Organizational Learning and Teamwork while the lowest were Hospital Handoffs and Non-Punitive Response to Error. On the other hand, dimensions on safety Awareness that received the highest positive perceptions were Teamwork and Safety Climate while the lowest was Stress Recognition. Perceptions of nurses also varied significantly across ranks in position titles and work settings. CONCLUSIONS: There are identifiable dimensions that can be improved in both Safety Culture and Safety Attitude that can have a positive impact on nurses and potentially impact nurse-patient and hospital-sensitive outcomes through hospital-wide improvement programs.