Meet The Interns
2/5/2015 – Last February, more than 500 of today’s leading nurse scientists, and those studying to become tomorrow’s, gathered in San Antonio, for the prestigious Southern Nursing Research Society (SNRS) conference. Nursing researchers from across the 14-state SNRS region came to participate in panel discussions, present scholarly papers and discuss their work with colleagues and peers.
Students in nursing research, primarily doctoral students, presented their own studies at the conference and were recognized with awards for their work.
Among the winners? Corinna Hughes, a second-semester junior at the University of Kentucky College of Nursing who earned the top Minority Health Student Poster Presentation Award for her study, “Exploring Racial Differences in Biomarkers, Stress, and Anxiety Throughout Pregnancy.”
And the Distinguished Student Poster Award? That went to Christina Thompson, another undergraduate nursing student from UK working under noted nurse scientist and faculty mentor Kristin Ashford, PhD, APRN, associate professor, UK College of Nursing.
“They used to call it the doctoral student poster session,” says Patricia Burkhart, PhD, RN, associate dean for undergraduate studies at the College who coordinates the Undergraduate Research Interns program. “Now they just call it the student poster session because undergraduates were winning—our students!”
Three undergraduate nursing enrichment opportunities at UK are jumpstarting the next generation of nurse scientists, clinical nurse leaders and nursing educators—and just in time. A landmark report issued in 2010 by the Institutes on Medicine (IOM) called for doubling the number of nurses with doctorates by 2020 to fill anticipated shortages of nursing faculty.
“We need nurses prepared to take our places in practice, research and education nationwide,” says Dr. Burkhart, who came up with the idea for the Undergraduate Research Interns program in 2002. “We know that the sooner students are engaged in research, the more likely they are to continue their educations,” she says. In 2009, the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) honored the Undergraduate Research Interns program with an Innovations in Professional Nursing Education Award. Two other undergraduate nursing enrichment opportunities at the College have enjoyed similar success at getting students into advanced studies earlier. The Undergraduate Nursing Practice Interns program, formerly called Nurse Scholars, was established in 2000 for students interested in careers in clinical leadership. The Nursing Skills Lab Interns program, established in 2009, was actually inspired by students who were interested in becoming nursing educators one day. “It’s remarkable what happens when you unleash student minds,” says Dr. Burkhart of the College’s enrichment opportunities and the students they attract.
Each nursing enrichment program has its own criteria and all recruit top nursing students, up to 20 in each program in a semester, for a hands-on, mentored experience in a specialty area. Selected students spend four hours a week for two (and up to six) semesters depending on the program and earn academic credit for their participation. They are paired with a senior nurse mentor who supervises the intern’s final project. By graduation, many students will have contributed to scholarly papers, attended national nursing conferences and presented their projects to interested stakeholders thanks to their nursing enrichment experiences.
Hughes says she definitely plans to pursue her doctorate sooner rather than later. “I want to get a head start and build a foundation for myself.” She is awed by the accomplishments of the College’s nursing research faculty but even more impressed with their approachability.
“They’ve incorporated me into so much, it’s amazing,” she says. “I’ve learned how a research team works, what goes into writing grant proposals, how to collect data in a clinical setting, what it’s like to be part of an interprofessional collaboration—all of it. I see what they’re doing, and I want to do the same.”
Hughes was selected for a prestigious summer 2014 externship at the Mayo Clinic, one of 50 nursing students chosen out of 800 applicants nationwide. Now her mind is on her own research study and the manuscript she’s preparing, hopefully for publication. She’s already finished the literature review. “So far I haven’t seen anything quite like what I’m doing,” she says. You can feel her excitement.
The career options open to nurses today are wider and broader than ever, says Karen Stefaniak, PhD, RN, associate adjunct professor at the College of Nursing and coordinator of the Undergraduate Nursing Practice Interns program. Each semester, Dr. Stefaniak asks her undergraduate nursing practice interns what they’d like to know more about. Nine times out of 10 she knows what they’ll say—nursing roles. “And they want to hear about them from nurses who are actually serving in those roles.”
As a longtime nurse leader and former chief nursing officer for the University of Kentucky Albert B. Chandler Hospital, Dr. Stefaniak brought a lifetime of experience in nursing leadership to the College when she joined the faculty soon after retiring from her hospital position in 2008. She also brought with her a wealth of valuable contacts—friends, colleagues and senior nurse leaders at UK HealthCare and beyond. For the first seven weeks of each semester, Dr. Stefaniak calls on those contacts—and is quick to make new ones—for a weekly panel made up of advanced practice nurses in a specialty area. Students hear straight from the source what it’s like to work in pediatrics, forensic nursing, home health, emergency care and the list goes on and on. Many students discover an interest in a branch of nursing practice they’d never even considered. Dr. Stefaniak says the majority of practice interns plan to continue their studies after graduation. “This week I’m having a panel where representatives from each of the college’s DNP tracks will speak.”
Dakota Lawler, a May 2014 BSN graduate and undergraduate nursing practice intern, says the panel discussions were particularly valuable to him. “I was so indecisive about what kind of advanced practice I wanted, so it really helped clarify things for me,” he says. “We got to talk to flight nurses, traveling nurses, doctorally prepared nurse practitioners—it gave us all a lot to think about.”
Lawler, a native of Paducah, Kentucky, and the first in his family to go to college, took advantage of every opportunity to lead and excel when he began as a BSN student at the College. He was president of his class, a student advocate on the Faculty Advisory Council, a member of the College’s Undergraduate Practicum Committee, a peer tutor and part-time nursing tech—and all while serving in the National Guard, part of the officer commissioning school program. Still, when he learned about the College’s nursing practice internship, an enrichment opportunity that would give him a chance to explore the world of nursing practice in even greater depth, he jumped at the chance.
For his final project, a requirement of all interns in the enrichment programs, Lawler thought he’d like to do something related to infection control, an area that had always interested him. Dr. Stefaniak had just the mentor: Kimberly Blanton, MHA, MSN, RN, NE-BC, enterprise director of Infection and Prevention Control/Safety at UK HealthCare.
Originally, Lawler planned to do a “secret shopper” study of hand hygiene compliance at Chandler but what he was learning about Central Line Associated Blood Stream Infections (CLABSI), intrigued him. Each episode of CLABSI—an infection easily prevented by practicing sterile technique and a using a 15-second cleaning protocol— adds an average of two weeks to a patient’s length of stay.
And the cost to the nation’s hospitals? From $4,000 to $6,000 an episode in non-reimbursable costs. With The Joint Commission’s and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s support and information, Lawler created a knowledge-based PowerPoint presentation to educate staff nurses on CLABSI and the evidence-based policies and practices to prevent it. He also presented it to a group of UK HealthCare nurse managers and College faculty members who gave it high marks as a potential training tool in evidence-based practice for staff nurses across all units as well as in nurse orientation.
“Now if someone is unsure about how or when to change a dressing, for instance, they can look at the presentation instead of looking through policy books or having to search it out themselves,” says Lawler.
Lizbeth Whipple already had a degree in psychology when she decided to go to nursing school. Now finishing her second year at the College, the 31-year-old mother hopes to get her practice doctorate and work in a clinical setting as well as teach. The Undergraduate Skills Lab Interns program is good preparation for both, says Jennifer Dent, MSN, RNC, lecturer for the College and coordinator of the program. “They’re not only learning to teach the skills but staying fresh in their own at the same time.”
As an intern in the Second Degree BSN lab course, Whipple assists students learning to conduct health assessments, calculate “med math” and practice an increasingly complex series of nursing skills—from how to give injections and insert nasogastric tubes to how to relate to and communicate with patients and families.
Now in her second semester as an intern, Whipple loves working with other students. She’s also feeling more and more confident in her own clinical skills. “I’m really looking forward to the day when they become second nature,” she says. “Nurses who have been in practice a long time don’t even have to think about them anymore so they’re free to concentrate on higher-level thinking and decision-making.”
The clinical lab itself is an impressive place—roughly 10,000 square feet of dedicated space with rooms that look like patient rooms in a hospital and examining rooms in a clinic. High fidelity mannequins that can be programmed to speak, exhibit symptoms and even show pain are used in simulation exercises to help students practice clinical skills, as well as critical thinking skills.
Role-play exercises are also part of the mix. Last semester, Whipple participated in an exercise on patient interaction and communication. She played the role of a young woman recovering from cancer surgery who had just learned from doctors she wouldn’t be able to have children. Lab students playing the nursing roles dealt with their patient in very different ways. “Some were nervous and stood back, all in a row with their hands behind their backs and didn’t know what to say,” says Ms. Whipple.
“Others would ask if they could sit down next to me or would put their hand on my arm and ask me questions or just listen.” It was a powerful lesson on the importance of body language and communication cues, says Dent, and a safe way for students to experience a situation that could be overwhelming. “She really made it a great learning experience for them.”
Preparing the next generation of nurse leaders is the goal of every major nursing program in the nation. As one of them, the College is keenly aware of the mission and grateful to be pursuing it in an environment where academia informs nursing practice and nursing practice informs academia.
Their students are grateful, too. “You don’t get into UK unless you’re a top student,” says Lawler. “Everyone wants to succeed and to see each other succeed. That’s the way it is here.”
