High-Fidelity Simulation: Using Constructivism to Move Beyond the Books in Nursing Education
Abstract: The healthcare environment is dynamic and requires nurses equipped to deliver quality care. New nurses are entering a health care environment that demands competent, skilled nurses ready to deliver care to a higher acuity patient population. Regulatory mandates refuse to compensate acute care hospitals for never events, or events considered as preventable to patients. The nursing labor shortage places increased demands on an existing pool of aging and over-worked nurses. The dilemma is how to educate nurses that are knowledgeable, skilled, and capable of delivering safe, quality patient care and evaluate the success of the educational efforts. This paper is a work- in-progress project. The researcher will use contructivism, a naturalistic methodology for the multiple case study inquiry. The participants will consist of three deans of baccalaureate nursing programs who have implemented high-fidelity simulation in their nursing curricula. The other participants will consist of nine recen