Preparing students Nursing for future healthcare: Virtual reality in paediatric settings

The VRNURSE4KIDS project involves partners in 4 European countries. Virtual Reality (VR) is a technology that allows users to be fully immersed in a virtual world through a multisensory experience. It has been demonstrated that VR decreases pain, stress and anxiety in children during nursing procedures. Therefore VR has become increasingly applied in hospitals. We started from the observation that relatively few studies have assessed nurses’ health technology perceptions and acceptance. Hence it is not clear to what extent VR is accepted by nurses. In literature on the application and/or integration of VR into nursing education is limited. It is largely unknown to what extent VR is part of the nursing education and whether nursing students learn how to implement VR in daily clinical practice. As the use of VR is becoming more widespread in health care, it is important that nursing educators take the lead in integration of innovative healthcare technologies in nursing curricula. Studies also showed the positive impact of the use of new technologies in the preparation of students for health professions. VR could bring new learning experience, but also the opportunity to prepare for the use of new technologies in future practice.

Given these considerations, the objectives of this VRNURSE4KIDS project are: (1) to increase knowledge, competences and skills of nursing students towards VR as well as their intention and acceptance to use VR in clinical practice; (2) to increase awareness and attention towards VR among nursing students and lecturers, involved stakeholders in health care (education) and hospital partners; (3) to improve the quality of nursing education by structurally embedding the VR course in their program and integrating digital competences in the nursing education.

The following project activities (project results, PR) are carried out, thereby using a stepwise and total approach: (1) Identification and understanding the barriers and facilitators towards implementation of VR in hospitals, in particular in pediatric settings (PR1); (2) Development of the digital competence framework for nursing education, elaborated for VR (PR2); (3) Designing and development of an interactive, attractive open-source eLearning training course on VR including a course manual, followed by a piloting among nursing students (PR3, PR4, PR5); (4) Development of an instruction film with implementation protocol, integrated in the e-learning course (PR6); (5) Skillslab training on VR, followed by implementation of VR in clinical practice (PR7) In order to achieve these goals, a wide range of stakeholders with different background were involved during the project such as nursing students, lecturers, curriculum managers, hospitals, technological and IT partners, policy makers, researchers, etc. In addition, the output of the project activities and the developed materials were disseminated by all partners, using different streams of online and offline promotion and communication at both national and European level.

This project makes the preparation of students for the health profession attractive by using new technologies in their preparation and move the education of student nurses into a new future with the use of available technologies. This project results in (1) a digital competence framework for Nursing education, elaborated for VR, being a starting point to elaborate digital competences for other new technologies relevant for nurses and (2) an open source, interactive learning course on VR, including an instruction film, skillslab training and implementation in clinical practice. The stepwise and total approach of this project and the cooperation with relevant stakeholders from different background (education, clinical practice, applied research and business in VR technology) contribute to innovation of nursing education and practice. Hence, this project triggers nursing students for new technology in health care, making them pioneers for implementing digital innovations in clinical practice in order to optimize care for children and reduce pain and anxiety during nursing procedures.