Teaching the Teacher: Implementing a Tool kit to Standardize Effective Preceptorship of Prelicensure Nursing Students.

Background: Faculty can support successful preceptor-led clinical experiences by providing registered nurses with educational resources to guide them in the preceptor role.

Purpose: To upgrade our institution's educational resources using an online platform that enables just-in-time access.

Method: This was a quality improvement project to create and implement an educational resource tool kit for prelicensure nursing preceptors.

Taking on the challenge of clinical teaching in nursing homes.

While the goal of professional nursing programs is to ensure that students have a basic level of competency to care for older adults in a variety of care settings, the greatest challenge is to garner students' enthusiasm about caring for older adults in nursing homes. To increase and strengthen the professional nursing workforce in nursing homes, schools of nursing must ensure that students have appropriately placed, well-designed, and innovative clinical experiences in nursing homes with faculty who are knowledgeable about the nursing home environment and the professional nursing care needs of its residents. Four factors identified as keys to success in developing exemplary clinical experiences for students in nursing homes include: (a) nursing homes with positive reputations and providing quality care, (b) faculty knowledgeable and enthused about nursing homes, (c) committed partnerships between schools of nursing and nursing homes, and (d) creative and innovative clinical teaching strategies.

Interdisciplinary rounds: impact on patients, families, and staff.

Interdisciplinary rounds are a new care coordination strategy in several healthcare settings. This article describes the process used by clinical nurse specialists in one institution to broaden existing discharge planning rounds to interdisciplinary rounds. In addition, a survey queried advanced practice nurse subscribers to two listserves, the ANPACC and CNS-L, to determine how other institutions conducted interdisciplinary rounds, including structure, membership, and leadership.

Implementing preterm labor guidelines: a collaborative care improvement process.

Health care organizations today are being challenged to deliver care that is cost-effective, satisfying to patients, and based on quality outcomes. Urgency created by inadequate bed capacity as well as financial opportunity prompted United Hospital's Birth Center to launch care improvement activities aimed at assessing appropriateness of antepartal length of stay. Collaboration between all members of the health care team enabled a steering committee to implement evidence-based provider practice guidelines targeting variance around preterm labor management.