Information-seeking process and clinical scenario solving: introduction of a new tool in nursing education.

Background: Nursing education has recently undergone changes to improve care. These changes require innovative and transformative strategies in nursing education. Search as learning is one of the educational methods this study was conducted to determine the effect of the information searching process on scenario-based learning in nursing students.

Methods: This study is a single group semi-experimental study that was conducted on 38 nursing students in 2021. Students first drew a concept map according to their existing knowledge about two scenarios (diabetes and trauma). The students then searched the medical databases and drew another concept map after the search. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, paired mean tests and Pearson correlation coefficients.

Results: The results showed that the mean scores of the participants in the diabetes scenario before and after the search were 18.32 ± 5.50 and 19.13 ± 7.54, respectively, and those in the trauma scenario were 18.58 ± 7.69 and 29.61 ± 7, respectively (P < 0.01). The mean scores of the details of the conceptual map before and after the search in terms of themes, number of levels and relationships were statistically significant. In both scenarios, there was a positive correlation (p < 0.01) between learning and the number of correct webpages (r = 0.74 for trauma and r = 0.64 for diabetes), as well as between search time and the amount of learning (r = 0.77 for trauma and 0.64 for diabetes).

Conclusions: The results showed that search as learning in nursing education scenarios led to student learning. It is recommended that nurse educators use this method as a tool in nursing education to increase students' awareness and develop their thinking skills. Further research is recommended to determine the effectiveness of this method with other educational methods.