Using an academic-practice partnership to enhance ambulatory care nursing skills

Abstract

BackgroundAmbulatory nursing services are essential to healthcare in communities, but nursing curricula often omit ambulatory care training. The purpose of this project was to enhance ambulatory care competencies among nursing students and provide ongoing education for practicing nurses through an academic-practice partnership. MethodsA four-year externally funded project targeted enhancements to undergraduate nursing curricula and development activities. Students received didactic content and clinical experiences and were evaluated to assess critical ambulatory care nursing skills. Existing continuing education offerings were enhanced with team-based practice content. ResultsDespite pandemic-related clinical training changes, data from multiple quarters showed improvement in students' perceptions of self-efficacy (1.7–4.28-point increases) and actual performance (3.46–4.05-point increases) of core competencies on the 20-point evaluation scales. In addition, students rated simulations favorably, with scores ranging from 1.4 to 1.9 on the 2-point subscales. ConclusionAn academic-practice partnership provides mutually beneficial opportunities for enhancing the ambulatory care nursing workforce through undergraduate education and training and professional development for practicing nurses.