Nursing staff perceptions of student contributions in clinical settings.

Because nursing is a practice discipline, students are placed in clinical settings to collaborate with professional nurses in caring for patients. This descriptive study aimed to explore the benefits and limitations of undergraduate nursing students in the clinical setting. A 54-item instrument, Nursing Students' Contributions to Clinical Agencies, was used to collect data from staff nurses (N = 84) at three hospitals.

Complementary and alternative therapies: a new frontier for nursing education?

The field of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) is relatively new to Western health care and scientific research. The American public is embracing the use of CAM, and consequently, health care professionals will have to integrate these therapies into their professional practice. With the addition of basic CAM components to the newest NCLEX-RN blueprint, nursing education programs at all levels must incorporate CAM into their curricula.