Teaching Communication Skills to Advanced Practice Nursing (APN) Students Using Linguistic-Based Communication Training

Purpose: Conducting conversations with patients and their family members is an integral part of Advance Practice Nurse (APN) clinical work, and during which the APN must recognize and skillfully manage both verbal and nonverbal communication. These conversations are made more difficult when delivering bad news. Although a necessary competency to prevent ill effects to patients and families, little research has been conducted on how to implement the instruction in the APNs education. The purpose of this research is to explore and describe associations between application of a psychosocial linguistic methodology (Clin-Com Tool (CCT) with standard communication instruction (SPIKES protocol) and improvement of student's communication skills.

Methods: A mixed-methods approach was employed, as integration of quantitative and qualitative data to enhance understanding of how CCT instruction improved student communication. All APN students received standard instruction with the SPIKES protocol during weekly assignments in the academic portion of their coursework. The intervention group received additional communication training with CCT Tool. All participants then engaged in their On- campus Immersions and Standard Patient (SPs) simulation scenario with the theme of delivering bad news to patient and/or family. A focus group was conducted with SPs and clinical faculty to evaluate qualitative information on the students’ performance. All groups participated in pre-and post-questionnaire, as well as, a follow-up questionnaire at six months after the intervention

Results: Preliminary results showed that most APN students felt various levels of competency and experience with breaking bad news prior to training However, many did not have to originate the conversation of an initial diagnosis of DBN. The majority of the students valued the didatic and simulation training provided in the curriculum and gained proficiency in completing the task. There was no significant difference in student's preception with the additional CCT training. However, the DBN training for APN students was beneficial especially with their patient encounters with subsequent clinical courses.

Conclusion: Communication especially with relational crisis is an important competency for APN students. Hence, it is essential for faculty to include

a DBN training with simulation experience for students to feel confident in their skills