Nursing (Doctor of Nursing Practice)

Long-acting injectable antipsychotics (LAIs) are underutilized pharmacological treatment options for those with schizophrenia. Research examining psychiatric prescribers' relationship with LAIs hypothesized that their knowledge deficits, uninformed attitudes, and poor prescribing practices contribute to the underutilization of LAIs in clinical practice. There is a gap in the literature regarding educational interventions to address psychiatric prescribers' knowledge deficits, uninformed attitudes, and poor prescribing practices. The purpose of this Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) research project, based on the Knowledge to Action Framework, was to develop and evaluate the impact of a web-based educational toolkit on the knowledge, attitudes, and practices of psychiatric prescribers. A seven-part web-based module that included a presentation of the created educational toolkit regarding LAIs and a before and after knowledge, attitudes, and practices questionnaire was hosted on an online-open source learning management system and disseminated to psychiatric prescribers. Findings indicated that the web-based educational toolkit slightly improved the knowledge, attitudes, and practices of psychiatric prescribers regarding LAIs. It also revealed a relationship between a positive change in attitudes and psychiatric prescribers practicing in a hospital setting. This DNP research project reflects the essentials of the DNP degree. It contributes to the body of knowledge of psychiatric nursing, created a lasting reference tool for prescribing LAIs, filled gaps in the literature regarding LAIs, supports the use of continuing web-based education and toolkits, and serves as a catalyst for other studies regarding LAIs.

Patients who are receiving comfort-directed care at the end of their lives will be cared for by nurses throughout their hospital stay. Providing bedside end-of-life care requires specialty assessment, communication, and intervention skills. Nurses who provide bedside end-of-life care in the acute care setting may not receive specialty palliative care training as part of their undergraduate education. To address this an educational curriculum was designed by members of the Palliative Care team and a Palliative Superuser training program was developed. Guided by the Comfort ALways Matters (CALM) framework the course focused on specialized assessment and symptom management, holistic approaches to patients and their caregivers, and communication instruction. Course description is a four-hour workshop presented by certified registered nurse practitioners from the inpatient palliative care team. Nurses who complete the superuser training will act as mentors to their peers and will continue to receive educational updates every two months. A goal of training ten percent of nurses in the acute hospital setting was set. Individual class size is limited to 10 attendees to facilitate small group discussion. Program availability was advertised by email and flyer to the managers of all inpatient units. Nurses who expressed interest and volunteered to attend were chosen by their managers and enrolled in the class. Pre- and post- testing of nurses who volunteered for the training revealed improvement in knowledge, confidence, and comfort in providing end of life care after completing the initial training session. Early positive results of the QI initiative suggested that ongoing training will be valuable to the institution and the patients.

Background: The problem of interest is focusing on an increase for education within the forensic interviewing process for individuals within the multidisciplinary team and community stakeholders. The PICO question is: Does the development of an assessment tool kit for the child forensic interviewing process increase knowledge of qualified observations evidence by the multidisciplinary team and stakeholders. The Theoretical foundation for this research will aim to develop and present a toolkit that will enhance and positively affect the knowledge and practices of the forensic interview, based on the Iowa Method of Evidence-Based Practice and a Knowledge-to-Action structure.

Methods: Methods utilized a pre-survey, presentation, and post-survey; which entailed an example of setting the stage introduction, rapport, encouraged narrative, facilitators, interview instructions, narrative practices, and follow-up questioning. The analysis of the forensic interview consisted of a model structure in which the multidisciplinary team was given a pre-survey questioning acquired knowledge from previous education, a presentation entailing a structured conversation with a child intended to elicit detailed information about a possible event or events that the child has experienced or witnessed, and a post-survey that measured knowledge gained.

Results, conclusion, implications, and recommendations: The scholarly project gathered information through the pre/post surveys focusing on assessing the information interviewers typically review prior to conducting the forensic interview. The surveys revealed a lack of uniformity within the protocols and the preparation practice, as well as the observational viewers. Summary of data collected, there were limitations to the results which stemmed from a lag in the post survey sent out, as well as a decrease in response from the attendees. In conclusion, there was evidence of learning, which was observed through the results obtained.

The Pearson correlation was used with the result sought after to determine if there was a linear relationship between two quantitative variables, whether a positive or negative correlation. In this scholarly study, the variables were the pre and post survey measuring gain of knowledge by participants. Each question results were reviewed as data to the survey response, with a total of ten questions; both pre and post survey. The pre-survey there were 19 responses. The post-survey resulted in nine out of nineteen responses. Four questions had no statistical significance, however, the remaining questions relating to rapport with the child, impartial attitude, ground rules of the interview, appropriate process, open-ended questioning, and a value with discoverable evidence demonstrated a statistical significance.

This study evaluates the impact of training on providers’ confidence about using the MinuteClinic (MC) hypertension (HTN) guideline to conduct HTN management visits in MC. MC providers who participated or did not participate in the training/webex education sessions provided prior to the commencement of HTN chronic care services were surveyed and their confidence scores measured. T-test analysis did not show any statistically significant difference between the Trained group and the Non-Trained group. Factors enabling the lack of significant difference between the two groups and suggestions for further studies are discussed.

Nurse residency programs (NRPs) have been instrumental in assisting to bridge the theory-to-practice gap commonly experienced by new graduate nurses (NGNs). NRPs have also proven useful in improving retention, work satisfaction, confidence, and competence (Spector, et al., 2017; Ulrich, et al., 2010; Rosenfeld, & Glassman, 2016). Despite the overwhelming literature to support implementation of NRPs in all hospitals, to date, in the United States, only 31 hospital sponsored NRPs are accredited by the Commission on Collegiate Education in Nursing (CCNE) (AACN, 2019). Currently, public documentation on the number of NRPs accredited by the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC) are unavailable. Additionally, in Pennsylvania, only 2 hospital sponsored NRPs have obtained national accreditation. NRP accreditation holds health care organizations accountable and proves these programs have demonstrated quality. For an organization to undergo a significant change initiative, such as accreditation, a state of readiness must be present or created (Franquiz & Seckman, 2015).

Human Papillomavirus (HPV) is the most common sexually transmitted infection causing cervical, oropharyngeal cancers and genital warts. In the United States (U.S.), it is estimated that one in four individuals are infected, with an additional 14 million new cases of HPV infections occurring annually. HPV contributes to 17,600 cancers in women and 9,300 cancers in men annually. HPV vaccine is the most effective way to protect against HPV related cancers. However, there is a lag in HPV vaccination due to barriers such as: health care providers hesitancy to promote the HPV vaccine, low baseline knowledge of HPV and HPV vaccine, safety concerns, cost and system barriers. Studies show that there is low overall knowledge of baseline HPV and HPV vaccine among college students. The purpose of this study is to determine if an educational video intervention increases baseline knowledge of HPV and HPV vaccine in the attendees on a college campus in Northwestern Pennsylvania. To test this, a study design consisting of an educational session that utilizes an HPV educational video, followed by a brief question and answer session was developed. A questionnaire is implemented pre- and post-intervention to analyze HPV knowledge in participants. There were 22 participants who completed the study. Comparison analysis between the pre- and post-knowledge assessments show statistically significant improvement of results after viewing the educational documentary on HPV. The likelihood of getting a perfect score on the assessment increased by 13.7%, equating to a 70 percent reduction of incorrect answers from viewing the educational video.

This study examined whether use of an electronic medical record (EMR) to prompt screening of eating disorder risk among a college female population improved identification of risk for the disease. Data were obtained via a convenience sample of patients accessing a university health service gynecology clinic. The SCOFF tool is a well-validated 5-item questionnaire with sensitivity of up to 87.5% and specificity of 95% for bulimia nervosa and anorexia nervosa. Clinicians were prompted by EMR to administer the tool to all gynecology patients seeking care not related to eating disorder symptoms. A comparison of positive identification of eating disorder risk from the previous year, during the same time frame when EMR prompt was not embedded, was conducted via an EMR data search. Results show a relationship between eating disorder risk identification and EMR prompt (p = .0047). The study concludes that ease of use of the SCOFF tool combined with the EMR prompt improves screening for eating disorders in the college health setting.