Abstract
Nurse educators are challenged to prepare students to graduate with a high level of communication skill to effectively work with patients, families and professional colleagues. This manuscript describes an innovative pedagogical model developed for teaching therapeutic communication skills to pre-licensure nursing students through the use of simulation. This novel, theoretically based teaching and learning strategy is a replicable model that includes student and faculty preparation; pre- and post-assignments; tools for active engagement of students as role players or observers who utilize therapeutic communication techniques and critical thinking about therapeutic communication theory; tools for self and peer evaluation; and opportunities for inter-professional communication skill development. The model also serves as an alternative milieu to the clinical site. A brief literature review provides a theoretical and socio-economic framework.
Highlights
Creative teaching and experiential learning have emerged from the explosion in technological innovation; literature describing the use of simulation in psychiatric mental health nursing (PMHN) is scant
This paper provides a literature review of simulation in PHMN; describes a novel, replicable, low-fidelity PMHN therapeutic communication simulation model designed by nursing faculty at an urban health science university; and discusses lessons learned and future recommendations
Students are able to examine their own selves; the role of the nurse, including personal challenges to that individual student related to diagnosis, therapeutic communication and the nursing process; and the experience of the client as an individual who suffers from mental illness, utilizes a variety of treatments, and engages with mental health personnel and institutions
Summary
Creative teaching and experiential learning have emerged from the explosion in technological innovation; literature describing the use of simulation in psychiatric mental health nursing (PMHN) is scant. This paper provides a literature review of simulation in PHMN; describes a novel, replicable, low-fidelity PMHN therapeutic communication simulation model designed by nursing faculty at an urban health science university; and discusses lessons learned and future recommendations. This PMHN simulation model calls for experiential, real time exploration and demonstration of knowledge of psychiatric diagnoses and treatments, and the responses and responsibilities of the professional nurse in observation, assessment, communication, decision making, therapeutic intervention, and triage.
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