What should they teach in nursing school but don't. What do they teach but shouldn't?

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My impression of nursing school based on my very limited experience is that there are many things taught that while perhaps not a waste of time are none the less perhaps not the best possible use of that time. If you were made the supreme overlord of nursing school curricula what things would you delete? Conversely, what things would you add both in terms of content and methodology (perhaps you would teach the same stuff but would do so in a different manner). Could nursing schools today implement your ideas (if they wanted to) or would they be prevented by accredidation bodies from straying from approved curriculum?

I'd get rid of those stupid care plans!!!! I spent HOURS on these things in school, and I have never used one ONCE since working in the real world!!! I'm sure there are other ways to accomplish their objectives.

Actually, care plans are the closest things IN nursing school to what we have suggested. They introduce students to critical thinking. I know they're a pain in the rear, but a necessary one.

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Your care plans must have been a lot different than ours. I really don't feel the care plans we had to do helped much.

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At my school, we have a stimulator who is called Stan the man, he costs LOTS of money, but anyway, you can do absolutely everything to him, they can give him all sorts of different scenerios and you have to make him stable. He breaths, blinks, dies and you can revive him, you can give him all sorts of inneverventions and see how he reacts. Also, you can practice your skills on him such as vitals they can put him in a stressed situation and you take all him vitals then they have you critically think about why this is happening. Also, they let you tell the person that runs his CPU what meds you want to give him and then see how he reacts. He is just like a real patient, I think it was a very good idea to purchase him. They told us that they would like to purchase the ped stimulator also.

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Specializes in LTC, med-surg, critial care.
I'd get rid of those stupid care plans!!!! I spent HOURS on these things in school, and I have never used one ONCE since working in the real world!!! I'm sure there are other ways to accomplish their objectives.
Not that I like writing care plans but they show me a lot. When I look up interventions I learn what should be comming off the top of my head and what complications I should be looking for. This actually helps me "think like a nurse."

My clinical instructor last year would do "scenes" with us. Every once and awhile she'd spend the entire post-confrence time going through a different scene with each of us, she'd act up, yell, complain, pretend she had demetia...Afterwards each she'd let us discuss how we'd handle it or ask questions or explain something that should have been done.

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I spent an entire quarter giving bed baths. I would like to see LESS emphasis on AM care in clinicals, and MORE emphasis on teaching us the skills we need. And every time we ask for more exposure to skills, we are told that we learn them on the job, and so we shouldn't worry our pretty little heads over it.

I would like clinical instructors to do more "Grand Rounds". On clinical days, we may have 1 or 2 patients, but not get to look at a variety of patients, and see different conditions, or see assessments done on those patients. I feel vastly underprepared for patient assessment.

LESS psychosocial mumbo-jumbo. I didn't come to nursing school for a psych degree (which I already have), I came to learn nursing. Considering how few people become psych nurses, MUST we spend so much time on nurse-patient interaction, especially when floor nurses are so busy, they certainly aren't clarifying, reflecting, confronting, etc. etc. Give me more hard knowledge.

LESS paperwork, MORE patient contact.

That's my $.02 worth for now!

oldiebutgoodie

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Specializes in NICU.

I went through a BSN program and I really don't feel it prepared me for bedside nursing. True, we had all the education and theories in our heads, but the actual clinical preparation was just pitiful. We did clinicals in all required areas, but it was on such a small scale, it was almost useless. Even our senior year, we'd have ONE patient on a busy med-surg floor. HOW is that supposed to prepare a nurse for the real world??? I know students shouldn't have too many patients, but come on, 2-3 patients would have been much more realistic. I shudder to think what my classmates went through when they started working on med-surg floors after graduation.

I went into ICU and found the transition much easier because I was used to focusing on one patient. Of course, my program had NO ICU preparation - we'd have clinical days "observing" in different ICUs but never actually got to do anything. Thank goodness we had our final role transition course, where we spent 160 hours in the area of our choice being precepted 1-on-1. But to me, that bit of reality came way too late in the program for many of my classmates to understand how much different the real world was from school.

JMHO!

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Specializes in Emergency & Trauma/Adult ICU.

I would like clinical instructors to do more "Grand Rounds".

YESSS!!!!

Several of you mentioned case studies, clinical conferences, etc. My school does stress post-conference, but sometimes it gets pushed by the wayside after clinicals if 1) the instructor needs to leave in a hurry or 2) everyone is so tired that we all have that glassy-eyed look or 3) it's Friday afternoon and no one is in the mood to contribute more than "I thought my day went pretty well. Patient A's H&H is better today, and he's being d/c tomorrow."

I was also interested to learn that during our hospital system's recent JCAHO visit, they did their assessment by "following" selected patients from the time of their admittance/registration through discharge. I think the same method of "chart review" could be valuable for case studies for students.

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I went through a BSN program and I really don't feel it prepared me for bedside nursing. True, we had all the education and theories in our heads, but the actual clinical preparation was just pitiful. We did clinicals in all required areas, but it was on such a small scale, it was almost useless. Even our senior year, we'd have ONE patient on a busy med-surg floor. HOW is that supposed to prepare a nurse for the real world??? I know students shouldn't have too many patients, but come on, 2-3 patients would have been much more realistic. I shudder to think what my classmates went through when they started working on med-surg floors after graduation.

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That was a big advantage of the old diploma programs...we started with one patient, but ended up with a typical assignment of a team of patients by the time we were done with our med-surg rotation. And our clinical time was 3 full shifts a week (7a-3:30p). We sat in with the regular staff for report, and our leadership rotation consisted of being the team leader, assigning to the regular staff, giving report to the oncoming shift...the works. When I graduated, I definitely felt prepared for the "real world".

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Maybe someone should experiment with a "hybrid" of the old diploma method and the current ASN/BSN approach. Perhaps, some innovative hospital could partner with a University where a "student" would work three days a week as they did in the diploma days. Then they could attend lectures on a fourth day which would confer a degree at the completion of the program. One of the problems is that I'm not sure that the years of experience obtained from the "diploma" system have been successfully translated into the current nursing educational system. Perhaps there has been too much intellectual "egg head" intrusion from accredidation agencies at the expense of common sense.

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Maybe some schools do this but mine didn't.

I think they should have a class in nursing school called "Practical Application" or something. It would be a informal, fun class session where students bring up clinical situations or hypotheticals and the class with the prof would discuss how to handle it. Also, this class' heavy focus would be on case studies. This way students are learning critical thinking and also feeling like the situations that they study could actually occuri in their careers.

I know there are university programs that offer what you are talking about. OHSU in Oregon has a lab with computerized dummies that are programmed to have crises like and the students are taught how to handle certain situations and potentially save lives when these situations occur with real patients...:)

Jenna, Portland-Pre nursing...

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Maybe someone should experiment with a "hybrid" of the old diploma method and the current ASN/BSN approach. Perhaps, some innovative hospital could partner with a University where a "student" would work three days a week as they did in the diploma days. Then they could attend lectures on a fourth day which would confer a degree at the completion of the program. One of the problems is that I'm not sure that the years of experience obtained from the "diploma" system have been successfully translated into the current nursing educational system. Perhaps there has been too much intellectual "egg head" intrusion from accredidation agencies at the expense of common sense.

First there are many hospitals that employ nursing students as Aprentice Nurses. They are coupled with an RN preceptor and do everything an RN does. They must be in school and they must meet certain acedemic standards.

It has nothing to do with being "egg headed" the simple fact is the knowelge required today if far more sophositicated. Before you tell me I don't know what I am talking about I went to nursing school 35 years ago. I was within 1 month of graduation when I left because I became pregnant.

Then I returned in 1998.

I can assure you nursing has changed.

We only used a stethescope to take blood pressures, and IF you actually ownd one it was as good as the cheap disposable ones used in isolation rooms today. We were too stupid to ever imagine that we might learn to read cardiac strips. We made no critical decisions about a patient. I could go on and on.

As far as work 3 days and lecture one well nursing's role has expanded far too much to do that. The amount of knowledge from books and lecture need today by a beginner grad far exceed anything we conceived of back then.

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At my school, we have a stimulator who is called Stan the man, he costs LOTS of money, but anyway, you can do absolutely everything to him, they can give him all sorts of different scenerios and you have to make him stable. He breaths, blinks, dies and you can revive him, you can give him all sorts of inneverventions and see how he reacts. Also, you can practice your skills on him such as vitals they can put him in a stressed situation and you take all him vitals then they have you critically think about why this is happening. Also, they let you tell the person that runs his CPU what meds you want to give him and then see how he reacts. He is just like a real patient, I think it was a very good idea to purchase him. They told us that they would like to purchase the ped stimulator also.

"Stan the Man"? I don't why but I laughed when I heard the name. Thanks for the laugh.:)

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