Paper
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
656
Mentorship at a Distance: The St. Petersburg Oklahoma Connection
Carole Kenner, DNS, RNC, FAAN, College of Nursing, University of Oklahoma Health Science Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA, Marina V. Boykova, RN, BSc, Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, Children's Hospital #1, St Petersburg, Russia, Russia, and Jana L. Pressler, PhD, RN, College of Nursing, University of Oklahoma, Oklahoma City, OK, USA.
Collaborations and globalization have become buzz words. However, frequent use of these terms does not need to diminish their power as critical components of capacity building. Collaborations require considerable time and effort for them to work successfully. Collaboration across geographic boundaries was used to help one nurse initiate clinical research in a children’s hospital in St Petersburg Russia. This presentation will discuss work on a research project "Transition from Hospital to Home" that replicated and extended work from the US in Russia. The critical success factors in this project were: 1. selection of two mentors-one with research methods experience and the other with transition research experience; 2. willingness for the Russian nurse to work at a distance submitting written work via email for critique; 3. establishment of a timeline and timetable for evaluating progress; 4. use of telephone calls and face-to-face meetings in each of the countries as needed and 5. maximizing a small amount of money and other resources. The outcomes of this project were: better understanding of the culture and cultural needs in each country; identification similarities and differences in research findings across the globe; master's research project completed successfully; and a bridging of the professional chasm between two countries and two continents. The mutual learning of this collaboration in the mentoring process led to these outcomes and has set the stage for additional project to continue building Russian nursing research capacity.