Learning Experiences of Students during Operating Room Visits in a Nursing Practicum Focusing on Adult Surgical Patients

Abstract

This study aimed to clarify the learning experiences of students during a nursing practicum in which students visited operating rooms and observed actual adult surgical patients. Data collected from semi-structured interviews with students after their visits were qualitatively analyzed. As a result, six categories were identified：“practical understanding of surgical stress”, “correction of preconceived notions of the operating room”, “amazing of human vitality”, “a view of operative nursing that values the patient”, “increased interest in operative nursing”, and “increased devotion to patient care”. Through the observation of actual patients during operating room visits, students’ learning structure expanded from the knowledge level to the emotional domain. In addition, learning through operating room visits was found to promote students’ personal and ethical maturity in nursing. These findings suggest that it is necessary to identify methods and techniques of instruction that help to increase students’ interest and improve students’ care experience, and that it is important for nursing students to consider additional methods of educational guidance to supplement their learning in the operating room.