End-of-Life Nursing

The American Association of Critical-Care Nurses (AACN) needed a course covering end-of-life and palliative care for its Continuing Nursing Education curricula. They chose Enspire to create a virtual hospital where nurses could learn about and practice these skills.

Challenge

Nurses are often charged with providing end-of-life care and emotional support for both patients and their loved ones. Under pressure, many nurses panic and respond in ways that do not aid, and may even be detrimental to, dealing with the end of one’s life. In order to provide nurses with this necessary real-world experience, AACN sought to create an e-learning course containing believable characters and plausible hospital situations in which critical-care nurses could both learn about end-of-life care and apply their knowledge.

Approach

Enspire created a virtual hospital in which critical-care nurses become part of the staff and deal with several end-of-life care situations. To emphasize the gravity of these situations and provide an added effect of realism, Enspire used television-quality video and actors to provide background on patients and their families. Learners review patients’ files before entering their rooms, monitor patients’ symptoms, and provide assistance based on their assessments. The high degree of detail and raw emotion present in each character were necessary to provide a realistic, educational situation.

The course also emphasizes taking care of oneself while on the job. A Self Care Meter was created to remind nurses to take time for leisure to reduce personal stress. Periodically learners visit the self care section of the course and decide to participate in a stress reducing activity—such as taking a walk outside or making plans to see a movie with a friend—to keep the Self Care Meter close to 100 percent. A mentor character guides the learners initially, but then allows them to explore the hospital and apply their knowledge independently, thereby raising their confidence.

Outcome

The course was deployed in hospitals nationwide. It is used as part of the Continuing Nursing Education accreditation process. As a result of this training, critical-care nurses now have a higher degree of confidence when confronted with end-of-life care situations and are better able to serve patients and their loved ones. AACN stakeholder Linda Bell said, “I have already recommended you to several other nursing and health care organizations. I would work with you all again in a heartbeat!”