The Tarleton State University nursing department has received a grant of more than $200,000 to take part in a Texas study observing the needs of nursing education.

“The research grant is designed to answer two questions,” said Dr. Elaine Evans, a professor of nursing who will direct Tarleton’s area of the research. “What is the effective range of clinical hours needed to prepare a competent nursing graduate [and] what is the effective and efficient distribution of those hours and clinical experiences in simulation and traditional patient care?”

The study will focus on evaluating the merits of patient care and clinical hours versus classroom simulations.

“I expect we will find that the number of clinical hours in the program can be reduced by 25% and as much as 50% of the clinical hours in selected courses can be allocated to simulation experiences,” said Evans. “Traditional clinical experiences taking care of patients, families and populations as well as low and high fidelity simulation experiences are both necessary and valuable to prepare students for professional nursing practice.”

Over the next 30 months, students in Tarleton’s nursing program will help add to the data collected by the study.

“Students will participate in the project by providing valuable data for the study,” Evans said. “Currently students complete evaluations of their clinical and simulation lab experiences, including satisfaction. These evaluations will continue with the grant. 

Completion of a brief log is new to this project. Students will document using any smart phone, tablet or computer the number of patient encounters, number of procedures performed, direct patient care hours and number of total hours in the clinical setting.”

Tarleton will participate alongside three other higher education institutions and six hospitals in Dallas-Fort Worth.

“This is an exciting project that builds on previous research,” Evans explained. “As many as 1800 students from four nursing programs will participate in this grant. Increasing simulation experiences to replace some traditional experiences will allow the nursing program to continue to admit students at the current rate.”

Tarleton currently has 948 clinical hours in its undergraduate program, according to Evans, who added that planning for the study began in January and Tarleton nursing student involvement will begin in March.