A simple and short microbiology practical improves undergraduate nursing students’ awareness of bacterial traits and ability to avoid spreading infections

Abstract

BackgroundNurses are responsible for implementing appropriate measures to reduce hospital infections, especially with multidrug resistant bacteria, so nursing students should learn about microbiology. This helps them to understand bacterial dissemination and infectious disease control. Because of tight schedules, however, its teaching is limited in undergraduate nursing classes in Japan. We therefore tested whether a simple short practical session in a microbiology class could help to improve undergraduate nursing students’ awareness of bacterial traits and how to prevent infections.MethodsThis study involved second-grade nursing students (n = 76). Two short practical sessions (a total of 3 h, across 2 days) were used to assess the effectiveness of washing or disinfection on hand bacteria in a 16-class microbiology course (total class time was 24 h, plus an exam). Hand bacteria were sampled on LB agar plates with orientation during the first half-day, and the plates examined for colonies with distinct color or morphological traits, and discussed, in the second session, a week later. Questionnaires before and after the exercise were used to assess changes in awareness of unseen bacteria inhabiting around us connecting bacterial traits and how to prevent infections.ResultsThe results showed that the practical increased the nursing students’ awareness of fomites (utensils) (p = 0.0115), fomites (contact-based) (p = 0.0016), habitats (body surface) (p = 0.0127), action facilitating hospital infection (p = 0.0166), and changes in physical condition caused by bacterial infections (p = 0.0136). There were no changes in word associations (p = 0.627) or habitats (inside body) (p = 0.308). Difficulty score, which is an element in questionnaire psychometric properties, tended to be close to the expected score through the practical, but not statistical significant. In addition, regardless of before or after practical, Cronbach α score, which is an indicator of the reliability among items of multi-choice questions, showed > 0.8, indicating validity of evaluation items. Thus, the student’s awareness of unseen bacteria inhabiting around us was significantly increased as compared to those before practical in microbiology class.ConclusionsThe simple short practical effectively improved nursing students’ awareness of unseen bacteria inhabiting around us in microbiology course, useful for even tight teaching schedules.

Exploring How to Conduct Infection Prevention and Control Education in Undergraduate Nursing Programs in Korea: Focus Group Interview Analysis

“…They play a major role in ensuring that appropriate practices are in place to meet the infection control standards in their institutions [30]. Therefore, competency in IPC is a crucial component for implementing best practices for nurses to ensure patient safety and provide high-quality care [10,11]. In addition, nurses represent the largest group employed in health care, and they have the greatest degree of contact with and risk of infection from patients [12].…”

“…Previous research on IPC education has largely divided into studies focused on IPC education strategies utilizing standardized patient, simulation environments, or actual clinical situations for IPC education [7][8][9] and studies focused on the IPC-education elements such as microbiology, hand washing, healthcare-associated infection with standard precautions, preventive measures for medical personnel, and issues on patient immunity such as HIV/ AIDS patients [10][11][12][13][14][15][16].…”

Analysis of ten-year teaching evaluation of oral microbiology lab curriculum

“…In our previous study, we analyzed data from 2013 to 2022 and discovered that the oral microbiology lab curriculum helped enhance students' understanding of oral biology theory, as well as developing their hands-on skills and scientific research thinking [ 14 ]. There are also studies indicating that simple and short microbiology practical can enhance students' understanding of microbiology [ 15 ]. Building upon these findings, we have conducted further observations and evaluations of the experimental course from 2013 to 2022.…”