NCSBN Transition to Practice Site Coordinators Meeting Held

CHICAGO, IL--(Marketwire - May 12, 2011) - The National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN®) www.ncsbn.org recently held a special Transition to Practice Study (TTPS) kickoff meeting for the individuals who will serve as site coordinators (SCs) in the 112 selected hospitals in Illinois, Ohio and North Carolina during Phase I of this study.

As previously announced, the NCSBN TTPS will evaluate safety and quality outcomes in nurse transition to practice programs. It will compare patient outcomes in organizations that use the NCSBN transition model with those organizations that use their own methods of transition. This groundbreaking study is the only one of its kind to randomly assign sites to either a standardized transition to practice model or to a control group. The use of a control group will allow NCSBN to statistically analyze differences between study and control groups. The TTPS will also be the first to analyze actual patient outcomes in programs that transition new nurses to practice. While previous studies of transition programs have looked at retention rates, new nurse satisfaction, preceptor satisfaction, and nurse's perceptions of competence and confidence, prior research has not examined actual patient outcomes.

The ultimate goal of the SCs is to help ensure the integrity of the study by maintaining compliance with study protocol. During the kickoff meeting the SCs gained a better understanding of the details of the study and learned more about their specific responsibilities. The SCs are accountable for enrolling new nurses, preceptors and nurse managers, and instructing these participants about survey submissions and timelines. They will guarantee institutional support for allowing participants the allotted time during the work day to complete required surveys.

The SCs play a pivotal role in the study as they will gather hospital outcomes at the unit and hospital level, looking at issues such as infection rates, falls and medication errors, as well as patient satisfaction and nurse retention. The SCs will submit this data directly to study researchers at NCSBN.

Phase I of the TTPS will run from July 1, 2011 through December 31, 2012. The second phase of the study will begin in April 2012. It will follow the same study protocol as Phase I, but will incorporate newly hired registered nurses (RNs) who work in settings other than hospitals (such as long-term care, community and correctional facilities, and schools) and the addition of newly licensed practical/vocational nurses (LPN/VNs) who work in all health care settings. Once both phases of the study have concluded, the safety and quality outcomes of the control group along with those of the study group will be compared.

The National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN) is a not-for-profit organization whose members include the boards of nursing in the 50 states, the District of Columbia and four U.S. territories -- American Samoa, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands and the Virgin Islands. There are also seven associate members.

Mission: NCSBN provides education, service and research through collaborative leadership to promote evidence-based regulatory excellence for patient safety and public protection.

The statements and opinions expressed are those of NCSBN and not the individual member state or territorial boards of nursing.

National Council of State Boards of Nursing, Inc.
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Chicago, IL 60601-4277