1. Variability of clinical hours in prelicensure nursing programs: Time for a reevaluation?
- Author
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Cipher, Daisha J., LeFlore, Judy L., Urban, Regina W., and Mancini, Mary E.
- Abstract
• There is a large variability in the type and number of clinical hours in prelicensure nursing education. • This descriptive comparison study identified a wide range of traditional clinical and simulation hours across four prelicensure nursing programs and found no differences in licensure exam performance. • Higher numbers of clinical hours are not necessarily associated with better outcomes; a focus on best-practices of simulation and clinical instruction might be more informative than a singular focus on clinical hour quantities. In pre-licensure nursing education, there is no agreement as to the type, quantity and quality of clinical experiences that are necessary to produce a competent graduate. A descriptive comparative study was conducted across four pre-licensure nursing programs to identify numbers of clinical and simulation hours within targeted clinical courses. Two Associate Degree (ADN) and two Bachelor of Science (BSN) nursing programs participated. The final sample consisted of 271 students. Large variabilities in the number of clinical and simulation hours were identified across the four programs. Licensure exam pass rates differed by the individual programs, but there were no significant differences between the ADN and BSN programs on pass rates. These findings suggest that prelicensure nursing programs' licensure examination results were not commensurate with clinical hours. Future programmatic decisions regarding clinical requirements should be based on empirical evidence instead of sheer quantity of hours. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2021
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