Community/public health nursing faculty's knowledge, skills and attitudes of the Quad Council Competencies for Public Health Nurses

Abstract

Ten recommendations are proposed for key skill sets and necessary preparation for faculty to effectively teach C/PHN in baccalaureate schools of nursing.

Leveling the core competencies of public health nursing to evaluate senior baccalaureate nursing students

“…Many nursing programs have turned to non‐traditional clinical settings as opportunities for clinical placement in traditional public health clinical sites have continued to shrink. Other authors have identified the need to provide enhanced student support and public health role modeling as well as improved faculty development opportunities in public health to ensure students have optimal clinical experiences in non‐traditional clinical settings (Joyce et al, ; Leurer et al, ; Pijl‐Zieber, Barton, Awosoga, & Konkin, ; Pijl‐Zieber & Kalischuk, ; Wade & Hayes, ). It is imperative to continue to work with our traditional clinical settings in county and governmental public health agencies to provide clinical placements to as many students as possible.…”

“…There has been widespread use of Quad Council of Public Health Nursing Organizations Core Competencies for Public Health Nurses (Core Competencies) in academia (Brown, ; Campbell, ; Issel, Baldwin, Lyons, & Madamala, ; Jakeway, Cantrell, Cason, & Talley, ; Joyce et al, ; Oppewal, Lamanna, & Glenn, ; Siemon, Gallegos & Gehrke, ) and practice (Issel et al, ; Oppewal et al, ; Zahner & Henriques, ). Additionally, there have been increased calls to use public health competencies when developing and revising nursing curricula to ensure students have the knowledge, skills, and attitudes needed to provide population focused interventions (Brown, ; Carter, Kaiser, O;Hare, & Callister, ; Keller, Schaffer, Schoon, Brueshoff, & Jost, ; Siemon et al, ; Swider et al, ).…”

“…While there is significant support for the use of the Core Competencies as a framework for nursing education and practice, barriers to their use have been identified. Issues related to measurement of the competencies, the appropriateness of specific competencies, the advanced leveling of the competencies making them inappropriate for use with baccalaureate nursing students, lack of awareness and the large number of competencies have been recognized (Cross et al, ; Joyce et al, ; Oppewal et al, ; Schaffer et al, ).…”

Using a quality improvement model to enhance community/public health nursing education

“…Problematic areas of the CET included duplication in content, appropriateness of specific competencies, and subsequent length of the CET. Results of this QI led to the following actions and outcomes: Planned and implemented presentations to share findings and advocate for competency‐based education with nursing faculty organizations, curriculum committees and within schools of nursing. Utilized competencies to structure course, organize didactic content, simulation and practicum content, and support curricula change. Presented three national webinars to nurses to review competencies and clinical application. Repeated orientation/training of competencies each semester with faculty and community partners. Developed a coalition entitled “Partners in Population Health” at one university. Developed and implemented two funded research projects to validate the utilization of the competencies with C/PHN faculty (Joyce, Harmon, et al, ) and public health nurses working in government agencies. Conducted a content analysis crosswalk (Joyce, Brown‐Schott, et al, ) for global health (Wilson et al, ) and interprofessional global health competencies (Jogerst et al, ). Presented findings to the Quad Council Coalition and discussed concerns related to redundancy and appropriateness of competencies for baccalaureate nursing education. Invited appointments of two members from the multisite team to a Quad Council task force to review and revise the QCC‐PHN . …”

“…Education based on competency is an important goal (Joyce, Harmon, et al, ). However, nursing faculties throughout the United States struggle to determine which competencies are most critical to educate baccalaureate students (Callen et al, ; Tilley, ).…”