Using Deliberate Practice and Simulation for Psychomotor Skill Competency Acquisition and Retention: A Mixed-Methods Study.

Background: Quality, safe patient care is dependent on graduates who are proficient in the psychomotor skills of nursing. Competent skill acquisition and retention are key to reducing skill-based errors and reducing the risk of adverse patient events.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to explore the effect of deliberate practice combined with skill practice during high-fidelity simulation (HFS) scenarios on urinary catheter insertion skill competency and retention in prelicensure nursing students.

The Sandbox: Development and Implementation of a Technology-Enhanced Classroom.

Based on the call to transform nursing education, many nursing programs have begun to integrate more active learning strategies into the traditional classroom setting. Many educators have found successful integration requires an improved learning space that allows students to interact and work collaboratively. This article discusses a new innovative trend in higher education called the active learning classroom (ALC), how one college developed an ALC, and the impact of the ALC on the use of active learning strategies and student learning outcomes in the nursing education department.

Variation in nocturnality and circadian activity rhythms between photoresponsive F344 and nonphotoresponsive Sprague Dawley rats.

Background: Variation in circadian rhythms and nocturnality may, hypothetically, be related to or independent of genetic variation in photoperiodic mediation of seasonal changes in physiology and behavior. We hypothesized that strain variation in photoperiodism between photoperiodic F344 rats and nonphotoperiodic Harlan Sprague Dawley (HSD) rats might be caused by underlying variation in clock function. We predicted that HSD rats would have more activity during the day or subjective day, longer free-running rhythms, poor entrainment to short day length, and shorter duration of activity, traits that have been associated with nonphotoperiodism in other laboratory rodent species, relative to F344 rats.

Evidence of real-world effectiveness of a telephone quitline for smokers.

Background: Telephone services that offer smoking-cessation counseling (quitlines) have proliferated in recent years, encouraged by positive results of clinical trials. The question remains, however, whether those results can be translated into real-world effectiveness.

Methods: We embedded a randomized, controlled trial into the ongoing service of the California Smokers' Helpline.