Family nursing for undergraduate nursing students: the Brandon University Family Case Model approach

For family nursing to become an essential component of nursing practice, the authors believe that undergraduate nursing programs need to present family nursing theory and practice in such a way that "thinking family" will become an integral part of students' nursing practice. This article articulates how one faculty group created the Family Case Model (FCM) as a vehicle for embedding family nursing across five courses in an undergraduate curriculum, allowing students to become immersed in the lives of families. Five skeleton case families representing different cultures, family forms, and family illness experiences were designed to reinforce both individual and family development and response to illness. These case families were linked to specific courses within the curriculum dealing with the traditional medical-surgical content of undergraduate nursing programs. The FCM invited a focus on the reciprocity between illness, family members, and the nurse across courses. The article describes the development, implementation, and evaluation of the FCM.