Integrating the learning environment    

Nursing students at Villanova University are on the cutting edge of information synthesis. Preparing these clinical leaders for the “real world” requires dynamic teaching-learning strategies. In its state-of-the-art home, the College of Nursing is at the forefront of best practice: clinical simulation, which when combined with targeted nursing courses and the broad liberal arts education at Villanova, nurtures clinicians and leaders by building not only competence but also confidence and autonomy. 

Simulation: advancing critical thinking and professional knowledge

Transitioning to a new role, that of professional nurse or advanced practice nurse, requires new thinking. Through the use of patient care scenarios, faculty can model and facilitate the development of students’ skills of inquiry, clinical judgment and decision-making. Choosing appropriate assessment techniques and nursing interventions based on patient context, students manage the care of their patients. Computerized human patient simulators are at the core of this teaching-learning method.

The 12,000 square foot Learning Resource Center  provides 10 future-oriented clinical simulation labs for:

• nursing practice skills
• health assessment
• adult health
• maternal/child health
• critical care nursing
• nurse anesthesia
• teaching-learning
• individualized patient care experiences.

These labs—used by both undergraduate and graduate nursing students—are all supported by advanced technology. The family of simulators, which mimic normal and abnormal human physiology, include male and female adults, a pregnant woman who gives birth, children and infants.

A controlled setting promoting critical thinking, psychomotor skills learning and evaluation. Undergraduate students work with faculty, classmates and simulators in carefully crafted, increasingly complex scenarios challenging them to practice in a variety of clinical situations.

While freshman begin in the lab with basic communication, patient education and nursing practice skills, sophomores shift into the mannequin model with body system- and basic skill-based scenarios, garnering valuable experience as they move into the clinical area. Juniors and seniors practice the nursing care that accompanies intravenous infusions, hemodynamic waveforms, chest tubes and artificial airways along with encounters such as heart failure, blood transfusion reactions, postpartum hemorrhage or asthma attack. Through the simulation strategy, students then can apply their knowledge in the hospital, clinic or home setting when caring for actual patients.

At the graduate level, nurse anesthetist students practice intubations, managing changing hemodynamic and other physiologic parameters, and the sophisticated operating suite care they deliver to the critically ill patient. Nurse practitioner students build the higher level physical exam skills needed for their new role as primary care providers. Using scenarios with the realistic simulators, they can then also establish differential diagnoses, order and interpret relevant diagnostic studies and tests, prescribe medications and treatments and, in conjunction with the patient and faculty, establish a plan of care for the patient.

Regardless of their nursing experience level, through clinical simulation students improve their competence in terms of knowledge base, critical thinking, nursing process and interventions, communication, socialization and self-evaluation.