Community Nursing: Utilizing Information in Practice

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The practices of public health and school health nursing have evolved to a focus utilizing scientifically sound information to provide nursing care (Evidence-based Practice). Currently in Missouri, 68% of public health nurses and 69% of school nurses are prepared at an associate degree or diploma level. Many nurses lack the skills to create evidence-based practice since this process is acquired formally at the bachelor's level. This project develops a network of public health and school nurses who are competent in securing, analyzing and utilizing information in practice. Phase I trains participants to access information via the Internet through completion of two courses: Consumer Health and Professional Information. Consumer Health teaches participants to identify, evaluate and utilize appropriate consumer Internet sites, such as MedlinePlus, CAPHIS, and printed materials for use as resources. Professional Information provides a solid foundation of accessing and searching the web sites that are most helpful in finding materials for practice. (PubMed and other EBM resources); and methods to obtain documents. Both courses allow the students to develop hands-on practice connecting to the Internet, accessing the resources, searching for information, applying it to practice, and training colleagues and consumers. Faculty and staff at the University of Missouri- Columbia Health Sciences Library, The Missouri Liaison for the National Network for Libraries of Medicine, the Sinclair School of Nursing and the School of Information Science and Learning Technology, partner to provide this education. Following Phase I participants work in a learning community, coached by an assigned faculty mentor. In Phase II participants become trainers for other public health and school health nurses and consumers, sustaining the impact of the project through training and coaching of nursing colleagues. The Data Acquisition and Utilization Skill Inventory and Teaching Skills Inventory facilitate evaluation of both individual and project outcomes.