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The Journey to EBP

Monday, 18 November 2013

Kathaleen C. Bloom, PhD, CNM
Michele S. Bednarzyk, DNP, FNP, BC
School of Nursing, University of North Florida, Jacksonville, FL

Learning Objective 1: discuss the importance of preparing nursing students for evidence-based practice.

Learning Objective 2: identify appropriate content and teaching-learning strategies for evidence-based practice.

Evidence-based practice (EBP), crucial to all healthcare disciplines today, is an essential element in any nursing curriculum. It is critical that the foundation be laid early in the nursing curriculum, with the concepts and skills threaded throughout. This presentation will outline the EBP journey for graduate nursing students in one nursing program building on BSN EBP competencies and progressing through the masters to the DNP competencies.  The focus of the presentation is teaching-learning strategies for the development of EBP knowledge and skills necessary for nursing practice at any level.

At the baccalaureate level, students progress through a series of three nursing science courses that provide the foundation for graduate study related to EBP. Principles of EBP are threaded throughout all of their other nursing courses.

The master’s level builds on this foundation, with a research methods course that focuses on understanding of research designs. Integral to this course is the identification of important clinical questions for advanced practice nursing and the discovery, critical appraisal, and synthesis of  the evidence related to that question. EBP is the basis for all clinical courses.

At the DNP level, students examine more critically all components of EBP clinical decision-making, including understanding and critiquing the evidence, as well as incorporation of the knowledge and expertise of the clinician and the the wishes and desires of the patient and family in making those decisions. In a two-course sequence, students explore a clinical question and develop an evidence-based practice change protocol. This protocol is implemented and evaluated as their DNP Capstone Project.

See more of: Evidence-Based Practice Posters Session 2
See more of: Oral Paper & Poster: Evidence-Based Practice Sessions