Teaching Handoff Communication to Nursing Students: A Teaching Intervention and Lessons Learned.

Area of Science:

• Nursing Education
• Healthcare Communication
• Patient Safety

Background:

• New-graduate nurses require proficiency in providing clear handoff reports during patient care transitions.
• Existing nursing curricula often lack systematic instruction and practice opportunities for essential handoff communication skills.

Purpose of the Study:

• To describe a teaching intervention aimed at equipping nursing students with necessary handoff reporting skills for clinical practice.
• To evaluate the effectiveness of the intervention in enhancing student performance and self-efficacy in handoff communication.

Main Methods:

• Development and implementation of a targeted teaching intervention focused on handoff reporting.
• Utilizing skill repetition as a core component of the intervention.
• Gathering data to assess changes in student performance and perceived self-efficacy.

Main Results:

• Skill repetition significantly improved nursing students' performance in delivering handoff reports.
• The intervention led to increased perceived self-efficacy among students regarding their handoff reporting abilities.

Conclusions:

• Systematic instruction and repeated practice are effective strategies for developing essential handoff skills in nursing students.
• Recommendations are provided for integrating this vital communication training into nursing curricula to enhance readiness for practice.