Because nursing is a profession where trust must be established between caregiver and patient, having nurses who are confident in their clinical skills is important. Powell-Laney, Keen and Hall (2012) of Education for Health argue that any teaching method that increases the ability of nurses to manage patient care with confidence should be used in nursing education (Powell-Laney, Keen, & Hall, 2012, p. 11). These researchers also point out, “Healthcare is considered a high-hazard industry. To reduce risk, repetition in responding to similar clinical problems and choosing a response for a variety of patients, such as those experiencing a myocardial infarction, should increase the ability of the healthcare provider to respond quickly and adjust for differences presented by each clinical scenario” (Powell-Laney, Keen, & Hall, 2012, p. 12). These types of scenarios can be achieved through HPS.
On top of that, students may be more interested and engaged in HPS because it uses recent technological innovations and that may help to stimulate interest. Negrão Baptista, Amado Martins, Carneiro Ribeiro Pereira, and Mazzo (2014) of the Journal of Nursing Reference tell how in their experience students have expressed great satisfaction with HPS not just because it is a recent innovation, but because it will also objectively evaluate their performance of the clinical skill they are practicing (Negrão Baptista, Amado Martins, Carneiro Ribeiro Pereira, & Mazzo, 2014, p. 139). Feedback is always useful especially when learning life-saving skills
Since HPS does not do harm, and many students and educators like it, it seems as if there is little criticism that can be directed its way. Perhaps in the area of expense, but when compared with other methods, HPS is not expensive. Also, once the resource is obtained, it can be used for years to come to train generations of nursing students.
One issue that concerns some about HPS is that, in the end, it is a mannequin, and students know it is not a real human. Revell (2017) of New Scientist describes an HPS mannequin as having “static faces, often with an open mouth” (Revell, 2017). This is so the student can check airway. The faces of these mannequins show no emotions, which is not at all like what occurs with actual human patients. Nurses learn to treat the whole patient, so emotions may be an important part of learning clinical skills. Revell (2017) cites engineers who are working on making the faces of simulators express close to human-like emotions such as pain, disgust, anger, and fear. Beyond the helpful aspect of teaching nursing students holistic care, some emotional expressions help to diagnose medical issues such as stroke, pain or a reaction to medications. With these sorts of upgrades, HPS should become even more useful and popular among nursing educators and students.
Negrão Baptista, R., Amado Martins, J., Carneiro Ribeiro Pereira, M., & Mazzo, A. (2014). igh-Fidelity Simulation in the Nursing Degree: gains perceived by students. Journal of Nursing Reference, 4(1), 131-140. Retrieved from http://content.ebscohost.com/C...
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