Envisioning quality improvement education partnerships to teach pre-registration nursing students: A qualitative study

Abstract

BackgroundQuality improvement education partnerships occur when higher education and healthcare organisations collaborate to teach quality improvement. These partnerships have been used to increase pre-registration student engagement through experiential learning. However, there is limited evidence on the perspectives of higher education nursing academics and healthcare organisation participants in these quality improvement education partnerships. AimTo explore the experiences of quality improvement education and the use of partnerships to teach pre-registration nursing students, from the perspectives of higher education nursing academics and healthcare organisation staff. DesignQualitative interviews using reflexive thematic analysis. Setting and participantsHigher education nursing academics and quality improvement healthcare organisation staff in Australia. MethodsSemi-structured interviews were transcribed and transferred into NVivo software for coding. Reflexive thematic analysis was applied to determine main themes. ResultsFourteen interviews were conducted and there were two thematic threads identified. The first described the current state of pre-registration quality improvement education in Australia and included three themes: 1) not valuing quality improvement, 2) the nebulous nature of quality improvement, and 3) quality improvement is for others. The second thread envisioned the future of quality improvement education through partnerships and included three themes: 1) creating quality improvement cultural change, 2) preparing a quality improvement ready workforce, and 3) increasing student engagement in quality improvement. ConclusionQuality improvement education partnerships are an innovative way to engage nursing students with this content. By drawing on these partnerships as a learning tool for new nurses, there is potential to change the culture of quality improvement across higher education and healthcare organisations settings. The results in this study could be used by other health professions educators internationally to establish future quality improvement education partnerships.