An innovative teaching strategy for staff development departments. Olga and Bertha to the rescue

Efforts to address facility-wide educational topics in one staff development department have resulted in the development of innovative strategies to reach the maximum number of nurses with the greatest positive outcome. We were faced with the challenge of trying to improve discharge planning. A random chart review completed by the hospital utilization coordinator showed an appalling lack of discharge planning on the part of most hospital nursing staff. How would we entice nurses to attend inservice programs concerning such a potentially "dry" topic? Enter Olga and Bertha Smith, two characters devised to inject humor and entertainment into the educational sessions. The characters were role played by the authors and videotaped to show a standard scenario that demonstrated the intricate discharge planning needs of a young single mother (Olga) and her dependent mother (Bertha). Evaluations revealed extremely positive feedback for the characters as an enjoyable and effective way of teaching. Since then, Olga and Bertha have attracted, entertained, and educated nurses about three subsequent inservice topics.