Educational Interventions for Teaching Evidence-Based Practice to Undergraduate Nursing Students: A Scoping Review.

Athina E Patelarou,Stefano Finotto,Mariusz Panczyk,Antonio Jesús Ramos-Morcillo,Daniela Mecugni,Darja Jarosova,Jakub Dolezel,Joanna Gotlib,Brigita Skela-Savič,María Ruzafa-Martinez,Marta Smodiš,Evridiki Patelarou,Enkeleint A Mechili

doi:10.3390/ijerph17176351

Abstract

Background: Evidence-based practice (EBP) is the appropriate approach to guide healthcare personnel in their clinical practice. Despite the importance of EBP, undergraduate nursing students are not very much engaged and have a lack of knowledge and skills. Aim: The aim of this study was to gather, assess and synthesize evidence on educational interventions promoting evidence-based practice competencies in traditional undergraduate nursing students. Methods: This is a scoping review on sixteen English and non-English databases. A data extraction form was established including authors, year of publication, country, types of participant, specific objectives, study design, educational intervention, comparison if existed, and outcomes of significance. Results: The search strategy retrieved 8901 records in total. After screening for duplicates and eligibility, 20 articles were included in the qualitative synthesis. Improvement in EBP domains such as knowledge, skills, attitudes/behaviours, EBP beliefs, use, practice, level of evidence, critical thinking and future use of EBP were mentioned and assessed in different studies. Conclusions: EBP training can improve nursing students’ capacity in healthcare provision. Teaching EBP competencies along undergraduate nursing curricula should be a high priority at nursing programmes. The use of innovative approaches seems to be more effective than traditional ways. Education of EBP increases its future use and critical thinking and EBP programs improve self-efficacy and the level of evidence utilization.

Highlights

Evidence based practice (EBP) is an approach that guides healthcare personnel decisions to use the best available research evidence with clinical expertise and patient’s unique values and preferences [1].The main health professional organizations have set EBP as an important element of quality care, establishing EBP competency as a professional standard [2,3,4]
Secondary outcomes: reaction to the EBP educational experience, critical thinking and benefit to patients associated with EBP; Study design: Studies that performed quantitative and qualitative estimates of the effectiveness of the EBP educational strategies were used, irrespective of the presence of comparator groups, including randomized controlled trial, quasi-experimental controlled trial and before and after studies, and no limit was placed on the duration of the follow-up; Other criteria: Research papers that were published in peer-reviewed journals; published in English language and research team’s native languages (Czech, Greek, Italian, Polish, Spanish and Slovenian); from any geographical area
After screening for duplicates and eligibility, 20 articles were included in qualitative synthesis

Summary

Introduction

Evidence based practice (EBP) is an approach that guides healthcare personnel decisions to use the best available research evidence with clinical expertise and patient’s unique values and preferences [1].The main health professional organizations have set EBP as an important element of quality care, establishing EBP competency as a professional standard [2,3,4]. Nurses are less willing to support EBP promotion and implementation, and have less skills and knowledge in comparison to physicians [6]. Despite the importance of EBP, undergraduate nursing students are not very much engaged and have a lack of knowledge and skills. Aim: The aim of this study was to gather, assess and synthesize evidence on educational interventions promoting evidence-based practice competencies in traditional undergraduate nursing students. Improvement in EBP domains such as knowledge, skills, attitudes/behaviours, EBP beliefs, use, practice, level of evidence, critical thinking and future use of EBP were mentioned and assessed in different studies. Education of EBP increases its future use and critical thinking and EBP programs improve self-efficacy and the level of evidence utilization

Objectives

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion