The ability to introduce the elements of critical thinking into problem management and address patients’ needs is one of the principal skills that students will have to develop to have a proper clinical practice. Therefore, this activity, which allowed building students’ critical thinking by encouraging them to make decisions and solve healthcare-related issues in the context of restricted time and under additional pressure, was vital in their professional development. Specifically, the described activity has contributed to them developing the resilience needed to manage the needs of multiple people at the same time.
It is believed that the activity in question has enhanced the students’ ability to multitask in the clinical environment while avoiding instances of medical errors. There is no secret that medical errors often occur in the healthcare environment due to time pressure and increased workload (McEnroe-Petitte & Farris, 2020). The specified issues affect patients’ well-being and the length of their recovery time, thus, increasing their hospital stay and exposing them to unnecessary risks. Thus, training students to avoid the specified issue and increase the safety and accuracy of their actions was a vital step in improving their skills as future nurses.
The opportunity to investigate a scenario that was particularly close to a real-life issue was also an essential advantage of the task in question. Since all of the students sought to deploy patient-oriented care, they suggested several viable and effective solutions to the presented problem, indicating their readiness to work in the context of an actual clinical setting. Specifically, the student’s ability to focus on patient-specific issues and analyze data critically was discovered during the completion of the specified task.
As nurses and healthcare experts, students will have to face a range of complicated cases requiring urgent decision-making and impeccable analysis of the available data. Therefore, the second task inviting the learners to consider a scenario of diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA) represented an essential opportunity to train the skills of critical analysis and decision-making under time pressure. In the described activity, the focus on verbal communication was maintained throughout the simulation, which allowed testing the learners’ ability to process data immediately, retain crucial information, and produce an effective solution based on the assessment outcomes.
In turn, the use of the simulation as a tool for placing the students in the context of an actual clinical and nursing setting was a vital modification to the training process. Namely, the specified change has served to prepare the students for the complexity and unpredictability of the actual clinical environment. Therefore, the activity in question can be considered an essential step in the development of critical faculties in the learners. Moreover, the simulation setting has helped recognize students’ ability to function in real-life clinical settings (Kapucu, 2017). Introducing the factors of time pressure and challenges in communication between a patient and a healthcare expert, the specified activity demonstrated the students’ preparedness to manage clinical issues, including the obstacles to effective data management.
Overall, the learners have shown impressive resilience and flexibility in managing the described tasks, which indicates that they will be able to manage their tasks in the clinical environment properly and tend to patients’ needs accordingly. However, further training will be needed to build the skills of interdisciplinary collaboration and the promotion of effective information transfer. Though the students have shown the ability to avoid clinical errors during the simulation, additional complexity must be incorporated into the training so that they can develop resistance to obstacles in the actual nursing setting.
References
Kapucu, S. (2017). The effects of using simulation in nursing education: A thorax trauma case scenario. International Journal of Caring Sciences, 10(2), 1069. Web.
McEnroe-Petitte, D., & Farris, C. (2020). Using gaming as an active teaching strategy in nursing education. Teaching and Learning in Nursing, 15(1), 61-65.