Formal Mentoring Programs: An Exploration of Barriers to Implementation in Nursing Schools

Abstract Although there are over three million registered nurses in the United States, the national nursing shortage has reached epic proportions, with a vacancy rate of 9.9%. One of the contributing factors to the nursing shortage is the lack of qualified nursing faculty. While formal mentoring programs have been identified as best practice in supporting the expert nurse clinician in their transition into the novice nurse faculty role, these programs are not consistently implemented in schools of nursing. In this phenomenological study, the perceptions of nursing leaders regarding barriers to the implementation of formal mentoring programs were analyzed. Using a semistructured interview, six nursing school leaders were interviewed focusing on their perceptions of formal mentoring programs for novice nursing faculty. Findings of this study showed that nursing school leaders believe that mentoring programs are effective in supporting the novice nurse faculty in their role transition. Nursing leaders did, however, identify the barriers of human capacity, incentivization, and budgetary constraints to the implementation of formal mentoring programs. These barriers often outweighed the positive effects of formal mentoring programs. Nursing schools can enter academic partnerships with hospitals or secure grant funding to help support the implementation of formal mentoring programs. Additionally, working with novice mentors on how to teach someone to teach will be invaluable to the mentor dyad. Keywords: nurse, novice nurse academic, nurse educator, mentoring, orientation, transition, retentio

Issues associated with sound exposure experiments in tanks

For practical reasons it is often necessary to carry out sound exposure experiments on marine animals in tanks or pools that may have dimensions ranging from less than one meter to a few tens of meters. The boundaries of such tanks are almost invariably highly reflective to underwater sound, resulting in a sound field that can vary spatially in unexpected ways, and in which the relationship between pressure and particle velocity is quite different from that in an animal's natural environment. In this paper a numerical simulation based on the finite difference method is used to illustrate these effects. The results show that, at frequencies below the tank's lowest resonant frequency, the particle velocity and pressure fields vary smoothly in space and with changes in frequency, but that both the ratio of the particle velocity to the pressure and the way in which their amplitudes vary with distance from the source are different than in a freefield situation. At frequencies above the lowest resonant frequency the particle velocity and pressure fields, and their ratio, vary rapidly both spatially and with changes in frequency. Experimental measurements of pressure and particle velocity in a tank agree qualitatively with these results. © 2016 Acoustical Society of America

Underwater sound of rigid-hulled inflatable boats

Underwater sound of rigid-hulled inflatable boats was recorded 142 times in total, over 3 sites: 2 in southern British Columbia, Canada, and 1 off Western Australia. Underwater sound peaked between 70 and 400 Hz, exhibiting strong tones in this frequency range related to engine and propeller rotation. Sound propagation models were applied to compute monopole source levels, with the source assumed 1m below the sea surface. Broadband source levels (10–48 000Hz) increased from 134 to 171 dB re 1μPa @ 1m with speed from 3 to 16m/s (10–56 km/h). Source power spectral density percentile levels and 1/3 octave band levels are given for use in predictive modeling of underwater sound of these boats as part of environmental impact assessments

Violence brief interventions : a rapid review

This research was funded by the Violence Reduction Unit (Police Scotland).Provision of a Violence Brief Intervention (VBI) to young men undergoing treatment for a violent injury may represent a teachable moment for the prevention of future interpersonal violence in Scotland. Prior to intervention design, a rapid review of the research literature was necessary to examine existing programmes. After title and abstract screening, eight distinct VBIs were identified from full texts. Whilst none of the programmes were a perfect match for our intervention goals, they did demonstrate the potential effectiveness of brief interventions for violence prevention at both cognitive and behavioural levels. Key themes of successful interventions included brief motivational interviewing as an effective method of engaging with at-risk participants and encouraging change, the utility of social norms approaches for correcting peer norm misperceptions, the usefulness of working with victims of violence in medical settings (particularly oral and maxillofacial surgeries), the importance of addressing the role of alcohol after violent injury, the advantages of a computer-therapist hybrid model of delivery, and the need for adequate follow-up evaluation as part of a randomised control trial. This information has been used to design a VBI which is currently under evaluation.PostprintPeer reviewe

Nutritional status, growth and disease management in children with single and dual diagnosis of type 1 diabetes mellitus and coeliac disease

Background: The consequences of subclinical coeliac disease (CD) in Type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) remain unclear. We looked at growth, anthropometry and disease management in children with dual diagnosis (T1DM + CD) before and after CD diagnosis.<p></p> Methods: Anthropometry, glycated haemoglobin (HbA1c) and IgA tissue transglutaminase (tTg) were collected prior to, and following CD diagnosis in 23 children with T1DM + CD. This group was matched for demographics, T1DM duration, age at CD diagnosis and at T1DM onset with 23 CD and 44 T1DM controls.<p></p> Results: No differences in growth or anthropometry were found between children with T1DM + CD and controls at any time point. Children with T1DM + CD, had higher BMI z-score two years prior to, than at CD diagnosis (p <0.001). BMI z-score change one year prior to CD diagnosis was lower in the T1DM + CD than the T1DM group (p = 0.009). At two years, height velocity and change in BMI z-scores were similar in all groups. No differences were observed in HbA1c between the T1DM + CD and T1DM groups before or after CD diagnosis. More children with T1DM + CD had raised tTg levels one year after CD diagnosis than CD controls (CDx to CDx + 1 yr; T1DM + CD: 100% to 71%, p = 0.180 and CD: 100% to 45%, p < 0.001); by two years there was no difference.<p></p> Conclusions: No major nutrition or growth deficits were observed in children with T1DM + CD. CD diagnosis does not impact on T1DM glycaemic control. CD specific serology was comparable to children with single CD, but those with dual diagnosis may need more time to adjust to gluten free diet

Interoception in insula subregions as a possible state marker for depression - an exploratory fMRI study investigating healthy, depressed and remitted participants

Background: Interoceptive awareness (iA), the awareness of stimuli originating inside the body, plays an important role in human emotions and psychopathology. The insula is particularly involved in neural processes underlying iA. However, iA-related neural activity in the insula during the acute state of major depressive disorder (MDD) and in remission from depression has not been explored. Methods: A well-established fMRI paradigm for studying (iA; heartbeat counting) and exteroceptive awareness (eA; tone counting) was used. Study participants formed three independent groups: patients suffering from MDD, patients in remission from MDD or healthy controls. Task-induced neural activity in three functional subdivisions of the insula was compared between these groups. Results: Depressed participants showed neural hypo-responses during iA in anterior insula regions, as compared to both healthy and remitted participants. The right dorsal anterior insula showed the strongest response to iA across all participant groups. In depressed participants there was no differentiation between different stimuli types in this region (i.e., between iA, eA and noTask). Healthy and remitted participants in contrast showed clear activity differences. Conclusions: This is the first study comparing iA and eA-related activity in the insula in depressed participants to that in healthy and remitted individuals. The preliminary results suggest that these groups differ in there being hypo- responses across insula regions in the depressed participants, whilst non- psychiatric participants and patients in remission from MDD show the same neural activity during iA in insula subregions implying a possible state marker for MDD. The lack of activity differences between different stimulus types in the depressed group may account for their symptoms of altered external and internal focus