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Background: Indigenous representation is essential to ensure the health workforce is culturally capable and safe for Indigenous patients. However, Indigenous Peoples remain underrepresented in tertiary education and the health workforce. Aim: This aim of this paper is to offer an unmediated, Aboriginal nurse's perspective, on the experience, barriers and challenges of undertaking a Bachelor of Nursing degree. Design: Referenced reflection. Results: Education providers must be culturally capable themselves before teaching Indigenous content and facilitating sensitive classroom discussions. Financial, social and educational support is crucial to equip Indigenous students for tertiary study. Conclusion: To retain Indigenous students and contribute to a culturally capable workforce, it is imperative to listen and respond to Indigenous Peoples voices to shape learning experiences and support. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Indigenous nurses have the potential to improve access to health services for Indigenous people by ensuring that services are culturally safe and respectful of Indigenous peoples' needs. Therefore, developing a well-educated Indigenous nursing workforce is one way to improve the poor health outcomes of Indigenous Australians. A mixed methods study was undertaken to determine the current rates of enrollment, progression and completion of Indigenous nursing students in Australia and to explore student and staff perceptions of barriers to completion and strategies for success. The results indicate that the national average completion rates are 36.3% for Indigenous nursing students and 64.6% for non-Indigenous nursing students - an average difference of 28.3%. Indigenous nursing students and academics identified barriers to completion, which were similar to those identified in previous research. Success strategies, however, revealed the importance of individual student characteristics; academics' knowledge, awareness, and understanding; relationships, connections, and partnerships; institutional structures, systems, and processes; and, family and community knowledge, awareness, and understanding. This paper offers an overview of the integration and interpretation process that makes up the final phase of a mixed methods study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Given the continued disparity between the health of Indigenous Australian people's health and that of the broader Australian population, cultural safety is mandated as a component of undergraduate education as a strategy to improve health care. Evidence suggests that academics are not confident to teach cultural safety to undergraduate nursing students. Objectives: To explore the efficacy of an Indigenous teaching method (Teaching in Circle) to create culturally safe classrooms and to build the capacity and confidence of teachers to teach about cultural safety. Design: An Indigenous pedagogy was adapted for use in tutorials by teachers, with mentorship provided by an Indigenous knowledge expert. Teaching in Circle (TiC) methodology was implemented by teachers in tutorials. Methods: All nurse academics teaching in the Bachelor of Nursing program at a small regional Australian university were eligible to participate. Information about the project was provided in team meetings, with invitations to participate. Teachers provided a written reflection on the method and participated in regular on-line mentored support meetings throughout the teaching session. Data were analysed, using a reflective, inductive systematic process. Results: Final themes were "Sticking with initial disconcertment and discomfort"; "A renewed enjoyment of teaching"; "Learning and adapting", "The influence of the method on safety" and "Shifts in classroom dynamics". Impact Statement: 'Teaching in Circle', underpinned by respectful practice, positively influences culturally safe teaching and learning environments. The method enhances academics' confidence to teach cultural safety to undergraduate nursing students and supports an understanding of the essential components of culturally safe health care. Conclusions: Evidence suggests the method built capacity to teach and foster experiential learning of safety, and thus what is required to create a culturally safe teaching and learning space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purposes: This study evaluated the experiences of undergraduate student nurses with high-fidelity Human Patient Simulation Mannequins (HPSMs) and their perceptions of empathy. Methods: An exploratory case-study method was used to investigate the literature on empathy and the use of high-fidelity mannequins in nurse education. Two focus groups were conducted with eight third-year undergraduate nursing students in order to elicit responses to their experiences with HPSMs in their learning, especially in relation to empathy. Findings: Undergraduate nurses found it challenging when using HPSMs in the learning environment to relate to the mannequins as real. Students reported that in their experience, the use of mannequins was not conducive currently to the development of skills necessary for positive interpersonal development of the nurse–patient relationship. Conclusions: Focus group data and the empirical literature suggest that more research needs to be conducted into the use of mannequins in the development of nurse–patient interpersonal skills. Educators need to make evidence-based and pedagogically sound decisions about the use and limitations of HPSMs in undergraduate nursing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The transfer of nursing education into the higher education sector occurred over a 10-year period in Australia (1985-1994). Australian nurse leaders settled on a single outcome measure to be applied for all nursing graduates in the form of national competency standards. While this move enabled diversity, the lack of consistency in curriculum design has subsequently led to increasing confusion for clinicians who support students' learning in clinical placements. Using a shared critical reflection method, the authors reviewed (1) the evaluation comments from nurses in one nursing unit of a hospital in one Australian jurisdiction and (2) an historical review of nursing literature at the time of the transfer of nursing education into the higher education sector. The reflection suggests that the aim of the transfer, to create critical thinking graduates, has been undermined by the implicit clinical education practices that have since emerged. In order to address the contemporary challenges for clinical staff working with students from multiple universities, as well as increased student numbers to address the nursing shortage, we recommend a new approach to curriculum design: a national clinical curriculum drawn from social, as well as cognitive, learning theory that at once informs clinicians of students' potential abilities and provides the scope to accommodate the increasingly difficult and critical learning requirements of tertiary-based nursing students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]