Program Uses Sage's Comfort Bath® Washcloths as Teaching Aid
Nursing schools have the unique responsibility to transform eager young minds into strong, capable and efficient leaders in the clinical community. Students graduate as well-rounded clinicians that are not only highly skilled but are also sensitive to the patient experience. In order for students to better understand how to improve the patient experience, it is imperative for students to learn how to look at things through the patient's eyes. One institution, Duke University School of Nursing, is providing nursing students with the opportunity to be fully immersed in the patient experience - literally! Ann White, RN, MSN, CCNS, CEN, assistant clinical professor, and director at the Center for Nursing Discovery, takes a different approach to teaching her hygiene laboratory class. White needed a way to teach her students about the importance of hygiene and the role nurses can play in choosing effective products for their patients. Teaching About Patient Bathing
One of the tenets of the Duke University School of Nursing program is to improve the patient experience. To teach students about patient bathing, White created an interactive environment where students take turns being both nurse and patient. The nursing students compare two methods of bathing, traditional basin bath and disposable washcloth bathing. The students use Sage's Comfort Bath washcloths. "The interactive environment keeps the students engaged and makes the class more interesting for them," said White. "I choose to use Sage's Comfort Bath product in my lab class because it provided the most common and most researched based alternative to the traditional basin technique." Students are given basic information on the two bathing methods regarding the differences between the two methods and the effect each method has on infection control. Students acting as nurses wash one side of the patient's body using the traditional basin bath method and bathe the other side of the body with Sage's Comfort Bath washcloths. Both the nurse and the patient then compare the two methods. White has found that when students act as patients, they focus on comfort and feel, and when students act as nurses they focus on perceived patient satisfaction, infection control and ease of method. Stacy Williams, a graduate nursing student, found that while acting both as patient and nurse, she preferred the use of disposable washcloths over the traditional basin bath method. "I felt that when I was being bathed in the traditional method, my own dirty water was being used," Williams said. "I liked that you could throw the disposable cloth away and use a clean washcloth for each body part. I felt much cleaner." Williams also found that disposable washcloths did not dry her skin like the soaps used in the traditional basin bath method. Knowledge is Power
Through the interactive hygiene lab, White's goal is to give students a unique perspective on the patient experience, but also to arm students with the ability to make clinical and product decisions based on knowledge and experience. "When my students are nurses they will be asked to participate in product trials and will be exposed to vendors marketing their products," White said. "It is their [nurses] responsibility to be engaged in that process so they can be drivers in selecting products that create good outcomes for patients." White hopes to educate students that looking only at products by cost may not provide the best care for patients. She hopes to instill in nursing students that when making decisions that affect patient care, sometimes increased costs can result in decreased costs down the line as well as increased patient satisfaction. "I think nurses need to look at purchasing decisions from both the clinical and business side," said Williams. "Professor White's lab gives students the chance to begin to develop these skills." |
