Listening to stories: valuing knowledge from patient experience

This paper reports on a research project which explored students' perceptions of learning from listening to patient stories. There is a plethora of literature to support the value of learning from service users within professional education programmes and a growing body of literature suggesting that storytelling is an effective learning and teaching strategy. However, little evidence focuses on the process of learning from patients' stories during practice placements and this study was designed to address this knowledge gap. The study adopted a descriptive phenomenological approach employing in-depth, conversational interviews with a sample of twelve pre-qualifying nursing, midwifery and social work students. The findings confirm the value of service users as a resource for student learning and indicate that listening to patient stories was a strategy which all respondents adopted to access this source of knowledge. This paper recommends that educators should recognise and value this alternative form of knowledge; provide the space and opportunities for students to listen to stories during their placements and actively facilitate reflection on these learning experiences.