Benefits and Barriers of an Honors Nursing Program: Perceptions of 1st year Bachelor of Science Nursing Students

The honors undergraduate nursing program was established to meet the needs of outstanding baccalaureate students and to help develop future leaders in the nursing profession. Nine beginning freshman students shared their perceptions about an honors program at a university-affiliated school of nursing in the Northeastern United States. These participants perceived four salient benefits: enhanced learning, exploration of career paths, mentorship, and sense of community. Their perceptions of barriers included: high expectations, ambiguity of long-term benefits, and difficulties in conducting a research-based thesis. The authors concluded that their preliminary description of the findings presented several suggestions for developing a more personalized honors programs in schools of nursing.&nbsp

Motivation to Provide Care to Patients with At-risk Alcohol and Opioid Use: A Focus on Nursing Professionals

Background: Alcohol and opioid (AO) use problems present a global public health issue that contributes to deaths as well as economic and social burden. Objectives: This study aimed to examine the relationship between nurses’ demographic/background characteristics, personal attitudes, professional attitudes and their motivation to provide care to patients who use AOs. In addition, the study aimed to identify demographic/background and personal and professional attitudinal predictors of nurses’ motivation to provide care for patients who use AOs (AO-motivation). Methods: A descriptive, correlational design was used. Nurses were recruited from four hospital settings and four national nursing organizations. Nurses’ demographic/background characteristics, personal attitudes, professional attitudes, and motivation to provide AO-related were measured using an investigator-developed questionnaire as well as established personal and professional attitudinal sub-scales that targeted their perceptions related to alcohol and opioid use problems. Results: Demographic/background characteristics associated with AO-motivation were primary workplace and specialization. All personal attitudes were associated with nurses’ motivation to provide care for patients who use AOs with the exception of the psychosocial model. In addition, all professional attitudes were associated with nurses' AO-motivation. Moreover, the AO-motivation model demonstrated that working in community-based setting, perceived dangerousness, perceptions related to the disease model, work experience with substance use and work satisfaction were significant predictors of nurses’ motivation to provide AO-related care. Conclusions: The study demonstrated that there were demographic/background, personal and professional predictors of nurses’ motivation to provide AO-related care. The findings of this study can facilitate the development of interventions designed to target nurses’ motivation in order to promote the transfer of AO-acquired knowledge and skills into clinical practice, and to foster the implementation of AO-preventive measures

Beyond one term of mentoring: A new approach to the research mentorship of undergraduate students

Background: The Undergraduate Research Mentorship Program (URMP) at the University of Pittsburgh (UPitt), School of Nursing (SoN) was envisioned and implemented in the 2008–2009 academic year to expose undergraduate students to research early in their college educational experiences. Moreover, the URMP is a method to retain current students and attract new high school applicants to the SoN. Methods: This article presents (1) the program's conceptualization, objectives, implementation, and outcomes using descriptive statistics and (2) the strengths of the URMP as well as the opportunities gained and lessons learned through conducting the program. Results: The program has shown success in attracting students to get involved in research. To date, 63.3%–75.7% of participating students reported gaining various research skills from the URMP. Additionally, URMP students have reported participating in conferences and creating close relationships with their mentors; indeed, 97% of these students are interested in pursuing a graduate education. Moreover, the majority of URMP student participants (85.7%) have reported that not only the research experience met or exceeded their expectations, but also they were very satisfied with the research experience. Conclusion: Through the URMP, unlike a traditional didactic class, students can benefit from experiential learning, incentives to participate, and a mentoring relationship without the added pressure of obtaining grades at the end of the term. Keywords: Mentorship, Research, Nursing, Undergraduate, Educatio