Executive Leader & Nurse Educator Handbook

Clinical experience hours include activities completed under the direct supervision of your preceptor. You may count hours that are spent directly working toward the objectives of your clinical project. All clinical hours must be supervised by the preceptor during the academic term in which you are registered for the clinical course. Your clinical hour logs must accurately reflect the dates, times, and hours you were present at your approved clinical site and engaged in clinical activities under the supervision of the preceptor. Any instance of fabricated information in your clinical logs can result in disciplinary action under the university’s code of student conduct.

Lunch (whether spent in the office or out) and travel time to, from, or between sites (if traveling from one site to another). For clinical days of 8–9 hours, a minimum of one 30-minute break is highly recommended. If you are not able to take lunch, please note in the clinical log the reason for not taking one.

Any “rounding up” of clinical hours (i.e., counting 3.5 hours as 4) will be considered academic dishonesty and may result in failure of the course and possible dismissal from the program.

• Central line infection reduction through evidence-based nursing education

• Supporting new graduate nurses throughout their transitioning and beyond

• Prevention of hospital-acquired infections in outpatient settings

• Health care navigator program for community-based geriatric patients

• Gentle cesarean: evidence-based project

• Reduction of a hospital blood contamination rate

• Promoting breastfeeding during the first 6 weeks postpartum

Project Location: School health clinic (a full-service health clinic within a public school). The clinic is administered by an Advanced Practice Registered Nurse (APRN) and primary care is delivered by APRNs, RNs, and certified medical assistants (CMAs) who also work at the clinic.

Population Taught: CMAs

Preceptor: Clinic administrator (an APRN)

Project: The larger project is aimed at improving asthma-related outcomes by developing and implementing an asthma screening tool and developing screening and treatment protocols at a public-school health clinic. The screening tool will be administered by the CMAs to all students within the school under RN supervision.

Nurse Educator Student Role: The nurse educator student’s role in this project is to collaborate with the clinic staff and external public health officials to lead the development of the screening tool and develop and provide an education program to the CMAs on administration of the tool, develop screening tool education materials for use in orientation of new clinic CMA staff, and evaluate the effectiveness of this aspect of the project. The students will present their project outcomes to the school health clinic staff and the school’s administrators.

Project Location: Community health clinic

Population Taught: Patients

Preceptor: Clinic RN (MSN prepared)

Project: The larger project is aimed at improving the health outcomes for the young adults (18–26) with diabetes who are seen at this community health clinic. This age group of patients has less optimal outcomes than other age groups of patients with diabetes seen within this clinic. The root cause of the poor outcomes was found to be poor medication and dietary adherence. The project includes implementing group diabetic visits versus individual patient visits at the clinic for young adults with diabetes.

Nurse Educator Student Role: The nurse educator student will collaborate with clinic administration and the interprofessional (physicians, APRNs, RNs, nutritionist, and social worker) team on this project. The student’s role in this project is to develop a patient-focused education plan for delivery during the group visits and educational handouts. The student will also teach the group education, evaluate the patient’s perception of effectiveness of the education, and develop a longer-term evaluation plan to assess impact on the participant’s diabetes-related outcomes. The student will present the patient effectiveness perception outcomes to the interprofessional clinic team.

Project Location: Hospital

Population Taught: RNs, respiratory therapists, and nursing assistants.

Preceptor: Clinical nurse specialist

Project: This hospital’s acquired infection rate has increased over the past year. During a root cause analysis, it was discovered that a significant number of staff of all disciplines were not following proper handwashing protocols on the patient unit where infection rates are the highest.

Nurse Educator Student Role: The nurse educator student will collaborate with the nursing unit director, one of the hospital’s infection control nurses, and the unit’s clinical nurse specialist on this project. The student will develop an interactive handwashing educational program for interprofessional use; deliver the education to the unit RNs, respiratory therapists, and nursing assistants in group settings (the infection control staff will deliver the program to the other disciplines); and develop an evaluation plan for the project. The student will present the outcomes of the RN, respiratory therapist, and nursing assistant education to the unit director, clinical nurse specialist, and infection control staff.