Paper
Friday, 21 July 2006
This presentation is part of : Professional Nursing Education Initiatives
Utilizing the Expertize of Eighth-Grade Students to Revise Educational Material on a Complex Concept: Sepsis
Vida L. Johnson, MSN, S.E.P.S.I.S Project Team, Nursing, Banner Desert Medical Center, Mesa, AZ, USA
Learning Objective #1: The learner will be able to develop a survey tool to evaluate the clarity of teaching material.
Learning Objective #2: The learner will be able to utilize survey results to modify educational material.
Purpose: Developing teaching materials for patients and families can be challenging when addressing a complex concept such as sepsis. In an effort to provide a better understanding of this topic, the S.E.P.S.I.S Project team at Banner Desert Medical Center recruited a local eighth-grade science class to assist with the development of these brochures.
Description: After developing the two educational pamphlets for the public, “Severe Sepsis,” and “Sepsis and Activated Protein C,” these brochures were presented to an eighth-grade science class to critique. Twenty-six students were divided into two equal groups with each group given one of the two brochures to read. After reading the brochures the students were then given a nine-question, multiple-choice quiz specific to their brochure, which included a comment section, to evaluate their understanding of sepsis. The ninth question asked for a rating on a scale of 1-10 (1 being the easiest) “How easy was it to understand the brochure?” The results of the quizzes were tallied, and along with the written comments, were utilized to make revisions. The revised brochures were presented to the same two groups to read and they were given the same quiz to complete.
Evaluation/Outcomes: On the first quiz, the ninth question which asked for a rating on the ease of understanding had an average overall score of 5.5 (on the scale of 1-10, 1 being the easiest to understand). On the quiz for the revised brochures, the score was 5.1.  Also on the first quiz, the question “In basic terms, what is severe sepsis?” both groups had 0% correct answers. On the revised brochures both groups scored 23% correct. Using the recommendations of the students, the sepsis education pamphlets were modified to make them easier for the lay public to understand.

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