From Lifeless Passive Learning, to Unforgettable Interactive Learning: Developing a Drug

Infomercial

Presenter:
Jennifer Dougherty
RN, MSN
State University of New York at Ulster
Jennifer Dougherty has been a Registered Professional Nurse for 13 years. In her current role,
Jennifer Dougherty is a full time adjunct faculty member at the State University of New York at
Ulsters associate degree nursing program, for the past three years. Here, Jennifer Dougherty has
been enriching students education, and bridging the gap from classroom to practice of the
associate degree nursing students with pertinent research, and tools that she has evolved, learned,
and participated in. Jennifer Dougherty has been a true pioneer in technology based patient
safety related innovations.
Conference: The Organization for Associate Degree Nursing Convention
Nature of the Conference: Advancing quality and safety in healthcare.

Purpose: The purpose of this presentation is to share the results of changing the
associate degree nursing pharmacology teaching strategy from merely passive learning,
to interactive learning. This has been accomplished by the students creating an
infomercial for their choice of drug, and then sharing it with the class. This interactive
activity has enabled a better understanding of pharmacology, by obtaining a more
interactive learning experience. This equates to better patient care, and patient safety.
Outcomes:
o Attendees will be able to verbalize different passive and interactive teaching
strategies used currently or in the past for pharmacology within their institution.
o Attendees will be able to verbalize their experience with passive versus
interactive learning, and which gives better results.
o After examining, and viewing the facts presented, the attendees will verbalize
how they think interactivity can, or cannot not work in their institution when
compared to passive learning strategies.
Overall Significance:
While the population of the United States is increasing in age, there is most certainly an
existence of the issue of polypharmacy as 1/3 of adults are taking five or more
medications. Medication errors occur to 5% of hospitalized patients, making it the most
common error while in the inpatient care setting (U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services, 2015). It is imperative that nurses learn, and retain concreate information about
 pharmacological interventions at the associate degree level. By implementing the
infomercial, rather than the use of passive learning, students are able to demonstrate, and
verbalize an array of specific information on a variety of different drugs when compared
to using lecture, and reading methods of prior passive learning strategies. Results in the
first semester that the infomercial was implemented in pharmacology class resulted in a
61% pass rate, which was up from the 52% pass rate seen in the previous semester where
passive learning was used. During the following semester when this interactive strategy
was implemented, the pass rate was up 31% from the previous semester up to 92%. This
strategy showed a dramatic improvement in overall scores of the students. This will
assure that the program will produce nurses that are better prepared pharmacologically,
therefore improving patient safety, patient outcomes, as well as decreasing, or even
eliminating medication errors all together.

Reference
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (2015). Medication errors. Retrieved from

https://psnet.ahrq.gov/primers/primer/23/medication-errors