Paper
Thursday, July 12, 2007
Integrating Evidence-based Practice Principles into BSN Curriculum
Susan B. Stillwell, MSN, RN, CNE, College of Nursing & Healthcare Innovation, Arizona State University, Phoenix, AZ, USA
Market forces driving the adoption of evidence-based practice (EBP) in nursing curricula include the results of the National League for Nurses (NLN) survey reporting a greater emphasis on evidence-based education than in 1998 and that this trend is expected to continue (Speziale & Jacobson, 2005); the increase sought after Magnet designation for quality in nursing, which assumes EBP a hallmark of excellence in nursing services (Shirey, 2006), as well as earlier recommendations from the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (1998). In addition, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) supports reform measures aimed at reducing the gap between research generation and implementation of research findings (IOM, 2000, 2001). Yet, research skills that are highly valued and traditionally taught in academic settings are associated with original research (Wallace, Shorten, Crookes, McGurk & Brewer, 1999). A new vision for clinical education in healthcare professions includes an emphasis on EBP, which is one of the five core competencies that all health care professionals should employ to meet the needs of the 21st century health care system (Greiner & Knebel, 2003). A challenge for nursing educational systems is to prepare students to be lifelong learners which require nurse educators to amend traditional educational preparation of nurses (Callister et al., 2005; Burke et al., 2005) and embrace EBP. The purpose of this presentation is to describe a quasi-experimental study in which an integrated EBP curriculum was compared to a traditional curriculum for baccalaureate prelicensure nursing students. Outcomes were EBP beliefs and implementation of EBP principles. The methodology, curricular leveling of EBP principles and preliminary results across one semester of intervention will be presented. A specific focus will be on providing learners with principles that they can use in their settings to evaluate academic integration of EBP.