Investing within the nursing workforce by supporting practice and academic partnerships

Do recent nursing graduates have the competencies needed in practice? According to a recent study, only 23% of recent nursing graduates have the entry-level competencies essential to practice within the U.S., and only 34% have self-confidence (Wolters Kluwer, 2020).

The Covid-19 pandemic has only made this issue much more pressing as many clinical sites have been forced to shut because they didn’t wish to run out of private protective equipment on students, they felt uncomfortable with students caring for Covid-19 patients and didn’t wish to risk exposing students to Covid-19. Due to the dearth of clinical sites where students could possibly be trained, academic centers were forced to extend the variety of simulation programs to satisfy the growing clinical needs of their students.

Innovative approach

However, some healthcare organizations have taken a unique approach. Instead of stopping nursing students from entering health care settings, they developed and strengthened their practice-academic partnerships based on a model developed by the National Council of State Boards of Nursing and invited students into their clinical sites to help clinical staff.

Practice-academic partnerships have been around for a very long time; nevertheless, the pandemic has brought them to the fore to a greater extent than in recent times. In fact, NCSBN developed a brand new practice-academic partnership model to help nursing professionals in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic (NCSBN, 2020), which was subsequently endorsed by ten national nursing organizations.

How does the practice/academic partnership model work?

Simply put, healthcare organizations partner with an instructional center after which hire their faculty to work in each practice and academia to supervise pre-licensure students throughout their clinical training. In addition, students are compensated for his or her clinical time and receive academic credit for his or her clinical requirements. Accepted students not only receive comprehensive training in direct patient care, but additionally find out how the organization operates, use all essential equipment, and use the ability’s protocols. After graduation, lots of these students are hired to work at the identical facility where they trained because they successfully accomplished the ability’s orientation program while still at school. Consider a nurse “internship” program by which a clinical faculty member is present to look at and supervise the delivery of care.

These practice-academic partnerships are so effective since the collaboration between practice and academia determines the knowledge and skills essential to supply a “practice-ready nursing graduate.”

Impact on nursing shortages

As we start to understand the complete impact of the pandemic on the nursing workforce, one thing is obvious – nurse shortages will persist. As baby boomers and nurses from other generations determine to retire or leave the occupation altogether, we are going to need more nurses to fill these gaps. Using a practice/academic partnership model essentially provides healthcare organizations with the support to concurrently attract, train, and orient recent nurses. The upside is that these newly licensed nurses will then have more clinical experience than their previous counterparts, who weren’t a part of a practice-academic partnership and due to this fact couldn’t train in a clinical setting to the identical extent.

Overall, if we wish to be certain that the nursing workforce stays strong, investing in and supporting practice-academic partnerships will not be only beneficial but useful to all.

NCSBN, 2020. Policy summary: U.S. nurse leadership supports practice and academic partnerships to assist the nursing workforce in the course of the Covid-19 crisis. . https://www.ncsbn.org/14573.htm

Wolters Kluwer, 2020. Closing the education-practice gap: Building self-confidence + competence. . https://www.wolterskluwer.com/en/expert-insights/survey-nursing-readiness