TEACHING PROJECT SUMMARY 1

Teaching Project Summary

Taylor W. Neuburg

Old Dominion University

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Teaching Project Summary

The purpose of this project is to provide registered nurses at Maryview Medical Center’s

Intensive Care Unit (MMC ICU) with information necessary to utilize pressure injury prevention

products available on the unit consistently in patient care from shift to shift. The rates of hospital

acquired pressure injuries (HAPIs) on the rise and directly correlate with negative patient

outcomes (Meehan, Beinlich, & Hammonds, 2016). According to Edgar (2017), Pressure injuries

can lead to infection, scarring, discomfort, along with increased length of hospital stay, and cost

of care. With the rates of HAPIs on the rise, it is necessary to develop a teaching plan to educate

nurses about HAPI prevention strategies in efforts to decrease rates of HAPIs and improve

patient outcomes.

The American Association of Critical Care Nurses’ (AACN) Standards of Professional

Practice and Performance (2015) was used as the foundation for my teaching project.

Assessment, diagnosis, outcomes identification, planning, implementation, and evaluation are all

vital parts of the nursing process (Bell, 2015). The nursing process is the foundation of AACN’s

Standards of Professional Practice and Performance and is the guide used to create my teaching

intervention. The nursing process is typically used in relation with patient care, but it is just as

applicable towards addressing a problem and developing a teaching intervention. The chosen

standards address both the teaching and learning roles in nursing practice through outlining the

expectations and guidelines for practice.

Needs Assessment

The target audience is the nursing staff of MMC’s ICU. The learners will be 13 registered

nurses that voluntarily offered to participate in the needs assessment and teaching interventions.

The participants range in age from 24 - 36 years old. The target audience members all have a
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minimum education of a Associate of Science in Nursing (ASN) and maximum education of a

Bachelor’s of Science in Nursing (BSN). The presentation was designed to cater to a

professional culture due to the audience being colleagues in my workplace.

The nurses at MMC’s ICU are a population is of interest because a quality improvement

initiative was initiated in 2012 to decrease the rate of HAPIs on the unit. A unit-based

intervention of early detection of at risk patients and implementation of Prevalon boots, TAPS

system, and repositioning every two hours helped decrease rates. The study revealed that the

interventions reduced rates of HAPIs on the floor (Edgar, 2017). Even though nurses have been

provided with all the tools necessary to prevent HAPIs, pressure injuries are still occurring on the

unit. Since the necessary tools are provided on the unit to prevent HAPIs and injuries are still

occurring, a needs assessment needs to be conducted to further understand where the weakness is

between education and implementation.

Assessment of Informational Needs

Before developing a teaching plan, it is necessary to understand what the participants

already know, what they are interested in learning about, and what they perceive as barriers to

patient repositioning being carried out in practice. To get an understanding of the informational

needs of the target audience, each participant filled out a self-administered questionnaire

(Appendix A).

Learning Style of Audience

Before developing a teaching plan, it is important to understand the learning styles of the

target audience. Individuals that receive information in a way that is tailored to their learning

style have better outcomes and are overall more satisfied with the learning materials (Bastable,

2014, pg. 154). To gain insight to the individual learning styles of the target population of
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learners, the VARK Learning Styles questionnaire was used. The VARK questionnaire was

developed by Flemming and Mills and is used to identify visual, aural, read/write, and

kinesthetic learning styles (Bastable, 2014, pg. 154). The VARK questionnaire (Appendix B)

revealed that there were 4 visual style learners, 2 reading/writing style learners, 6 kinesthetic

style learners, and 1 learner that was both reading/writing and visual style.

Result of the Needs Assessment

The needs assessment revealed that inconsistency with use of products from shift to shift

is a problem on the unit that negatively impacts HAPI patient outcomes. The focus of the

teaching plan should be on pressure injury prevention products available on the unit and their

uses. If all nurses are consistent with the products and interventions being used, the rates of

HAPIs will decrease.

The Teaching Plan

The focus of the teaching plan was education on pressure injury prevention products

available on the unit and their uses. The teaching intervention was planned to last for a total of

30 minutes and take place in the conference room on the unit. The first 10-minute portion of the

presentation addressed the cognitive learning domain. A slide show (Appendix D) was used to

outline and explain the different pressure injury prevention products available on the unit and

their uses. The nurses provided with a printed copy of the slide show. A brief posttest (Appendix

F) was administered after the presentation of the products. The next 10-minute segment of the

presentation addressed the affective domain and provided the opportunity to identify personal

barriers to utilizing all HAPI prevention tools in practice through open group discussion. The last

10-minute portion of the presentation focused on the psychomotor domain of learning. A

demonstration of how to use the products was provided on a practice manikin. Prior to leaving
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the teaching session, nurses had to provide a teach back demonstration of how to use all the

HAPI prevention products on the unit. An example of the teaching grid used is provided in

Appendix C.

Implementation of the Teaching Plan

Overall, the day of the actual presentation went smoothly. All 13 of the nurses

that offered to participate were present for the teaching session. The night before the

presentation, I had gathered and set out all the supplies needed in the conference room. Even

though I was really nervous, all of my colleagues were supportive and respectful during the

presentation. The one major glitch faced was not being be able to record my presentation while I

was presenting due to HIPPA concerns. As a result, I had to record a mock presentation. The

mock presentation was accurate in depicting the content delivered in the presentation, but it

naturally did not convey the authenticity and “less scripted” version of my actual professional

presentation. The teaching plan was developed and implemented based on the cognitive learning

theory. The cognitive learning theory involves, “perceiving the information, interpreting it based

on what is already known, and then reorganizing the information into new insights or

understanding” (Bastable, 2014). The cognitive learning theory was used by reinforcing previous

knowledge about HAPI prevention tools and their uses through an educational intervention.

Education will empower and instill nurses with the confidence to implement all the tools and

provide consistency in products used from shift to shift.

Evaluation

The objectives of the teaching session were evaluated using a variety of different

methods. The evaluation methods used were a post test, question and answer session, and the

learners providing a return demonstration. The posttest (Appendix E) was used after the
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slideshow to evaluate if the learners could list the five HAPI prevention tools on the unit and

explain how they are used. All of the learners were able to complete the posttest with 100%

accuracy. A question and answer session was used after learners identified barriers to

implementing all HAPI prevention tools in practice and how to overcome the barriers

individually and as a unit. All learners actively participated in the question and answer session

and provided positive feedback. A return demonstration was used to evaluate the learner’s ability

to demonstrate how to accurately use the HAPI prevention tools. All of the 13 learners were able

to provide a return demonstration on the practice manikin with 100% accuracy. Overall, the

instruction was effective as evidenced by 100% of the learners meeting the educational

objectives. As an educator, I felt very organized and prepared. The instruction and teaching

session went smoothly. The learners were engaged and actively participated in the teaching

session. I also received feedback the learners enjoyed the teaching session and were thankful I

addressed the topic on the unit.

Summary

Nurses play a flexible role in delivering education and both formally and informally.

Education varies from educating patients about a disease process to doing a formal in-service

presentation to educate peers. This project was an eye-opening experience. I never realized how

many factors came into play with developing a teaching intervention. It was beneficial to learn

the full process of constructing a teaching plan and actually carrying out the teaching plan. If

there is ever a situation in the future where I have to educate peers professionally, I will

reference this project and use it as a guide. I am thankful for this experience; I now have a new

respect and understanding of nurses as educators.

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References

Bastable, S. B. (2014). Nurse as educator: principles of teaching and learning for nursing

Practice (4th ed.). Burlington, MA: Jones and Bartlett Learning.

Bell, L. (2015). AACN Scope and Standards for Acute and Critical Care Nursing Practice. Aliso

Viejo, CA: American Association of Critical-Care Nurses.

Edger, M. (2017). Effect of a Patient-Repositioning Device in an Intensive Care Unit On

Hospital-Acquired Pressure Injury Occurrences and Cost: A Before-After Study. Journal

of Wound, Ostomy and Continence Nursing, 44(3), 236-240.

Meehan, A., Beinlich, N., & Hammonds, T. (2016). A Nurse-Initiated Perioperative Pressure

Injury Risk Assessment and Prevention Protocol. AORN Journal, 104(6), 554-565.

The VARK Questionnaire. (n.d.). Retrieved February 22, 2018, from

http://vark-learn.com/the-vark-questionnaire/

Honor Pledge

I pledge to support the Honor System of Old Dominion University. I will refrain from any form of

academic dishonesty or deception, such as cheating or plagiarism. I am aware that as a member

of the academic community it is my responsibility to turn in all suspected violations of the Honor

Code. I will report to a hearing if summoned.

-Taylor Neuburg (electronic signature)

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Appendix A

Name:______________

Shift: Days (7am-7pm) Nights (7pm-7am)

Hospital Acquired Pressure Injury (HAPI) Survey

1.) What are pressure injuries and how do they occur?

2.) What interventions can be done to prevent HAPIs?

3.) What do you perceive as barriers to HAPI prevention strategies being carried out
on the floor?

4.) What solutions do you propose to fixing any suggested barriers?

5.) What would you like to learn more about in relation to HAPI prevention?
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Appendix B
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Appendix C
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Appendix D
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Appendix E

Posttest

1. List the 5 tools available on the unit used to prevent HAPIs and a brief description
of how to use them.
a.)

b.)

c.)

d.)

e.)
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