Solutions

Solutions powered by
Learn More.
Frame 586 (1)

Quality Manager formerly known as abaqis®

Mitigate risk and elevate your quality of care. Improving both clinical and business outcomes starts with a smarter, more integrated approach to regulatory training, continuing education and quality management.

Learn More

NEW TO THE STORE

hStream Content Marketplace

Connecting you to the Best Content. Access to 75 Partners and 35,000+ Courses in our Industry-Leading Marketplace. Streamline content purchasing, updates, hosting and connectivity for your organizational needs.

NurseGrid Learn

Online store for Clinical Learners. Individual CE Credit and industry products for Clinical Learners are now available through NurseGrid Learn (Beta). Explore our robust collection of courses that provides an unparalleled level of flexibility and choice.

DEA MATE Opioid and Substance Use for Practitioners

Meet the DEA's new requirement under the Medication Access and Training Expansion (MATE) Act in an online and self-paced 8-hour DEA MATE Act course specifically designed for practitioners, including Physicians, PAs, NPs, Pharmacists, Dentists and others.

LATEST & POPULAR

BLOG

Join Us at Thrive24: The Ultimate HealthStream Credentialing User Group Conference!
BLOG

Gen Z Enters the Workforce: How Healthcare Can Adapt Training Programs for the Next Generation
BLOG

Telehealth: From Pandemic Tool to Preferred Option
On-Demand Webinar

State of the Industry: What’s Next for Healthcare Quality & Safety in 2024?
CUSTOMER STORY

Quantifiable results highlight switch to jane®
ARTICLE

10 Trends for 2024: Absorbing New Technology, Facing New Realities, and Solving Old Problems

< HealthStream Resources

blog-images_drs-patients_608x320_artboard-16_lg

Five Steps for Teaching Each Clinical Judgment Competency for Nursing

April 1, 2021
April 1, 2021

This blog post is the fourth in a series about improving clinical judgment in newly hired nurses.

Teaching a clinical judgment competency for nursing students and new nurses is far more effective if you use an overall process that is systematic and formalized. Just such a method was shared during a recent HealthStream webinar, Improving Clinical Judgment in New Nurse Hires to Improve Patient Outcomes. The presenters for this webinar were Dr. Linda Caputi, a nursing education consultant, and Elease Caracci, Senior Product Manager at HealthStream. Caputi has over 30 years of teaching experience at all levels of nursing education. She is a certified nurse educator and a fellow in the NLN's Academy of Nursing Education. Having published numerous books, articles, and book chapters, Caputi’s latest work is Think like a Nurse: A Handbook, published in 2018. Elease Caracci joined HealthStream in 2016 with our acquisition of NurseCompetency and is now a senior product manager. Caracci's background in healthcare staffing, educational planning, and curriculum development, along with her management expertise, have made her a multi-faceted performer within the healthcare industry.

Three Assumptions about Teaching Clinical Judgment Competencies

Caputi has some guidance and advice for anyone considering teaching clinical judgment competencies:

  1. Most students in schools of nursing have not learned a systematic formalized way to think.
  2. Preceptors often cannot discuss the process they use to approach decision-making. As experts, they no longer examine their thinking—they automatically and intuitively walk into a situation and know what to do.
  3. It is best to use a training model that provides orientee and preceptor a unified framework, language, and approach to clinical judgment and thinking.

Five Steps for Teaching a Clinical Judgment Competency for Nursing

Caputi offers these steps as a way to teach individual clinical judgment competencies:

  1. Provide a definition of the clinical judgment competency. Explain what it really means in very understandable terms.
  2. Give an example of this competency from everyday life. It is important for the orientee and the preceptor to realize they already use this clinical judgment competency. It's always much easier to teach something new if you can relate it to something the learner already knows.
  3. Identify an example using this clinical judgment competency in nursing.
  4. Demonstrate and apply that clinical judgment competency when engaging in patient care. The preceptor can then provide feedback about the application of that clinical judgment competency.
  5. Discuss this specific learning experience with the preceptor, similar to debriefing after a simulation. It's extremely important that the preceptor asks high quality, high level thinking questions. Caputi suggests having questions “already developed for your preceptors, so that the preceptor can focus on the orientee's thinking.”

Access the Webinar recording here.