Nursing Curriculum Trends

The 21^st century has found the nursing profession in transition.  The shortage of nursing faculty and nursing practitioners has unsuspectingly contributed to the increasing gap between education, research and clinical practice.  The 2010 Institute of Medicine (IOM) has provided a blueprint for nursing leaders, nurse educators and nurses to unite academic pedagogy with comprehensive experiential learning to best prepare nursing students for clinical practice.  The shift towards population health will assist in another system challenge, which is the excessive healthcare spending.  To achieve this, Qulaity and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN) competencies were developed to avert the highly visible and controversial errors by utilizing client-centered collaboration based on evidence-based care and the incorporation of population health and technology to increase healthcare accessibility, decrease costs, and improve quality.  Ultimately, several initiatives have created frameworks that encourage nurses to advocate for themselves and their communities.  It is clear these frameworks are necessary, adaptable, and will pave the way for future safe and affordable nursing care.  Included in this blueprint is the reality that nursing programs are rejecting tens of thousands of qualified applicants due to budget contraints.  This is a problem for both academia and clinical work resulting in unprepared students, as well as burned-out staff and underserved patients.  Implications of current trends on nursing schools will be addressed, as well as recommendations for future direction.   Nursing Schools that maintain an up to date curriculum integrating the guidelines of the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) will develop progressive healthcare.  Incorporation of technology into our constantly changing healthcare environment with online or hybrid learning experiences which will increase the knowledge for electronic medical records, patient portals and tele-helath applications.  Population health has changed the perspective of concentration from acute care and disease management to promotion of health and preventive health in the community, leading to a lessened financial burden of healthcare costs.