The young nurse moves quietly, snapping on gloves as she steps into the patient’s room. The patient is crying.
It’s a situation where a nurse faces more than checking an IV drip. It requires training in an area that has become a critical trend in nursing: emotional intelligence and the soft skills needed to support patients, their coworkers, and themselves.
For students in Southern’s nursing program, these skills are about to be infused with next-level training through a $210K grant award received from the Davis Educational Foundation, established by Stanton and Elisabeth Davis after Mr. Davis’ retirement as chairman of Shaw’s Supermarkets, Inc. The funding means that an expanded library of simulations is about to add soft skills training to the mix.
“For nursing, this is vital,” said Dr. Maria Krol, chair of the School of Nursing. “You need to be an advocate for the patient. If a patient has a bad diagnosis, students need to know how to deal with that.”
Data has shown that many students struggle with work situations involving conflicts with coworkers, being assigned a task that seems inappropriate, and handling sensitive conversations. Without soft skills training, some new nurses may feel unable to handle these challenges, prompting them to quit rather than tap into effective communication.
“If you have a run-in with someone on the unit, you need to develop these skills. You have to know how to communicate,” said Pamela Forte, director of clinical education.
Forte said the training helps build resiliency. “It’s about knowing how to manage multiple aspects of their professions. They’re skilled at the technical skills, but they also need to have empathy and awareness, and read nonverbal cues from patients and families and coworkers,” she said.
The training will take place through Southern’s Sim Lab, which opened in the summer of 2022 and has added virtual reality functionality in its interprofessional facility. Situated within the College of Health and Human Services building, the lab is home to six simulated hospital rooms, four simulated outpatient clinic rooms, one simulated apartment for home healthcare, and two debriefing classrooms. Outfitted with video and audio capture technology throughout, the lab gives students the opportunity to observe their peers and participate in reflective learning opportunities facilitated by trained faculty members.
Krol said that with the additional soft skills training, the lab will help teach and test students on their ability to respond and communicate better. “As educators, we need to educate the entire person, and that affects patients, their families, physicians, and coworkers,” she said.
Faculty and coordinators operate the high-tech simulators. If a student conducts the exercise correctly, the patient improves. If an error is made, the patient declines. Students and their cohort will debrief after the training to assess their actions and discuss what went well and what could have been handled better. “It’s a safe space. This is a time when, if you make an error, no harm is done to anybody,” Forte said.
The team will evaluate students using feedback from practice partners, faculty and staff members, as well as focus groups.
Forte said the simulations offer students training to embed an important memory they can recall should it arise in a real nursing experience. These might include rare events like a postpartum hemorrhage or a GI bleed.
The program arose from the recognition of the ways communication has changed. Anecdotal evidence suggests that nursing graduates don’t know how to talk to families, patients, or even physicians on behalf of a critically ill patient.
“Maybe the patient doesn’t say anything to the doctor; the nurse should be able to see that the patient got bad news,” said Dr. Kimberly Lacey, director of assessment, quality improvement, and curriculum development.
Soft skills training can also help students recognize a situation that’s dangerously escalating and how to diffuse it, for staff as well as patient safety.
The training could begin as role-playing in the classroom, pushing students to have uncomfortable conversations.
“Having a conversation with a patient, recognizing the patient is upset, seems uncomfortable. It’s hard for students to do. The goal is to do (the training) in bits and pieces along the way so by the end of the program, they’re faced with a simulation that is going to be complex enough that they have to demonstrate these skills,” Lacey said.
The need for stronger soft skills in nursing is a nationwide issue. “Students don’t communicate with each other as much as they once did. They text, they email.” But the simulation approach stands to elevate student awareness to a crucial component of their future nursing experience—an element that some may not realize may be a tough challenge.
“Students look to check off, ‘I did this many IV infusions, this many catheterizations. The skills I want to do.’ They feel that’s the toughest part of nursing. But after you’ve done one of those a couple times, it’s not that bad. You’ll have muscle memory and recall of what needs to be done. What’s more challenging is dealing with humans,” Forte said.
The grant award follows a $179K grant received last year, also from the Davis Educational Foundation, to develop the nursing simulation program. These awards come as Southern recently earned the prestigious R2 research designation—a national recognition of its faculty and research quality. Southern is the first Connecticut university to attain the designation. The nursing school is fired up over the combination of honors.
“We’re just thrilled. We’re so excited to get this grant and get things going,” Lacey said.
