Improving Family Nurse Practitioner Students’ Confidence for Clinical Decision Making and Presenting Patient Information to the Preceptor

Abstract

Family nurse practitioner (FNP) students often lack the confidence to develop diagnostic skills and convey patient information to their clinical preceptor. Preparing FNP students for these tasks is essential to their clinical success. To describe the adequacy of interactive case studies to increase confidence in making clinical decisions and presenting patient information to the clinical preceptor. The authors developed three interactive case studies for student analysis during an on-campus intensive week prior to the students' first clinical rotation. Student confidence was examined pre and post to determine if the interactive cases had any effects on their diagnostic reasoning and skill in presenting patients to the preceptor. The pretest survey found that students were least confident in presenting a patient to the preceptor (21% not confident). After the three interactive case studies, students demonstrated a significant increase in confidence. Interactive case studies and role-playing the patient presentation prior to an initial clinical rotation is a successful educational methodology for improving FNP students' confidence for the clinical environment. Faculty can implement interactive case studies in traditional and online courses to foster student confidence.