INSTITUTE OF LIVER AND

BILIARY SCIENCES

DEBATE ON IMPACT
OF COVID 19 ON
NURSING EDUCATION

SUBMITTED TO SUBMITTED BY
NAME- MR. JITHIN NAME- HIMANI
THOMAS PAREL SANGWAN
LECTURER M.SC NURSING 1ST
YEAR
 IMPACT OF COVID 19 ON NURSING EDUCATION
Nursing is the nation’s largest health care profession. Nurses are the primary providers of hospital patient care
and deliver most of the nation’s long-term care.
The COVID-19 outbreak deeply changed our lives on different levels. Social restrictions and distancing
shaped in a different way our view of social relationships and behaviours. Like many aspects of daily life,
also education has undergone radical changes. Nursing care was strongly affected by the outbreak, not only
due to the risks in everyday practice, the heavy workload or the impact on nurses’ daily lives outside the
healthcare settings, but also nursing education as nursing is caring profession and it embeds in its roots the
close relationship with the patient, the touch, the patients’ body proximity as a way to communicate and to
deliver an effective nursing care.
The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted healthcare education and delivery, including both theory and practice
learning. COVID-19 and the resulting lockdown policies have far-ranging effects on nursing education, with
an impact in all its aspects, including educational equity, student's well-being, nursing curriculum, clinical
placement, and educational outcome.
Four recurrent topics that impact nursing education were identified in the literature
(1) Educational equity
(2) Student well-being
(3) Nursing curriculum
(4) clinical placement
(5) educational outcomes
Impact on Educational Equity
The migration of nursing education to online platforms has generated a new challenge: The digital divide
between the most affluent and least fortunate students. Many learners live in remote locations with limited or
no internet connection, insufficient financial resources, no access to required textbooks or campus libraries,
and do not own computers. While students may utilize their mobile phones for access, the device's type and
capacity provided a challenge due to limited memory space to download more complex learning resources
such as videos or voice-over PowerPoint presentations. The battery life of these devices is also a limitation.
Impact on Student Well-being
The stress and uncertainty brought about by the pandemic affected the mental health of nursing students. They
may have faced increased anxiety about their own health and the health of their loved ones, as well as
concerns about completing their education and entering the workforce during a healthcare crisis.
Nursing students had reported poor mental health during the COVID-19 outbreak. Epidemic caused
substantial stressors in their life such as financial problems, the need to relocate, and/or a lack of public
transportation. Obscured distinctions between home and school environments, as well as family obligations
such as caring for children and their schoolwork, were also identified as stressors. Some students quickly
welcomed this transition to e-learning, embracing its flexibility in geographical place and time, whereas
others felt uneasy due to lack of computer literacy or an absence of physical human connection and
camaraderie. In addition, the minimal in-person interaction between nurse educators and nursing students
gave prominence to poor motivation and reduced communication skills which caused uncertainties around
their progression and assessment.
Impact on Nursing Curriculum
Covid-19 changed the mode of educational delivery. COVID-19 highlighted curriculum gaps. Although these
technological resources are known and available, during the COVID-19 pandemic, heterogeneity has
emerged within the nursing faculties. Not all academic institutions have effectively implemented
technology to support students’ learning, perhaps because of the sudden and unexpected changes in the
education system, which had imposed the use of technological resources were not recognized as regulatory
requirements within the faculties. The curriculum which was a blend of theory and practical was disturbed.
Impact on Clinical Placement
The disruptive effects of COVID-19 had forced a quick shift in clinical practice for nursing students. As
clinical sites rebuffed practical experiences for students integrating clinical skills, developing needed
competencies became one of the most difficult curricular problems in nursing education. Patient interaction is
unique to nursing students' learning experiences. However, because patient interaction has been restricted and
constrained, nursing students faced difficulties developing their patient care competencies. While some
faculty members had opted to increase their use of video demonstrations, simulation-based training, and
online modules to help students develop clinical competency, these choices were not easily available in
resource-constrained universities. Furthermore, virtual simulations and high-fidelity simulation technology
were not widely available in developing countries due to access and cost constraints. Restoring students to the
clinical area provided difficulties in terms of professional supervision and safety. The expense of supplying
personal protection equipment to students and faculty for each clinical practicum interaction was also be too
expensive.
Competence development and maintenance both require a constant exposure to clinical practice, especially
in the last year students, who need to face the professional role soon. Competence is considered as a setting-
and time- specific concept where knowledge, skills and behaviors merge together.. The effect of the break
from clinical learning imposed by the outbreak is far to be measured, but we could reasonably suppose that
students’ competences are not still stable over time in undergraduate education and they could be affected
by a mastery loss. On the other side, the first year students need clinical practice to adjust into the nursing
role and, often, to be aware of their choice in nursing, in order to possibly change their educational career.
At the beginning of nursing education students experience uncertainty and the behavioral answer to these
feeling depend on their motivation and their coping strategies with the academic and the nursing practice’s
demands. When the direct relationship with the academic and the clinical environment is lost or switched to
a virtual one, students lose an opportunity to cope and to test their expectations with the choice they made.
The first clinical internship experience represents, in a sense, an imprinting moment for the professional
future. Due to COVID-19 pandemic, many students not only have lost meaningful chances of clinical
learning, but they will also not be able to recover them, with important implications to their competencies
acquisition and professional identity, that can be built only in the real clinical settings.
Impact on Nursing Educational Outcomes
Countries that decided to delay formative assessments and national licensure exams caused an immediate
impact on educational outcomes, limiting the availability of nurses in healthcare workforce and affecting the
range of possibilities available during and after the pandemic. An overlooked component of assessment that
should be highlighted during the COVID-19 outbreak is the capacity to tolerate stress, adapt to rapidly
changing circumstances in resource-poor settings, and have management and organizational abilities. These
aspects may now be more evident in the pandemic, and rubrics for student assessment and professional
licensure may be changed to reflect these elements. stressors include poor motivation and reduced
communication skills, which cause many other students to voice their concerns around their development and
assessment. For some students, disruptions in clinical rotations and coursework may have led to delays in
graduation. Additionally, licensure exams may have been postponed or altered, further delaying students'
ability to enter the workforce as registered nurses.
The COVID-19 outbreak heavily hit the clinical learning environments, as they are healthcare settings. The
situation affected students’ learning opportunities, since clinical placements were suspended, Universities
closed and in-person courses moved into online teaching. While lessons and courses rapidly switched into
online teaching, in order to safeguard students’ education and faculty’s activity, it was not possible to
manage the pre-clinical activities, such as simulations and labs, in order to support technical and relational
competences.
While COVID-19 has presented both challenges and opportunities for nursing education, it is evident that the
pandemic has catalyzed significant changes in the way nursing education is delivered and perceived.
COVID-19 outbreak deeply changed our healthcare systems’ view and change our nursing education view,
in a way to highlight more the nursing role outside the hospital in integrating different views of care and
healthcare professional collaboration. Nursing curricula should also focus more on patients’ empowerment
and self-care. The clinical nursing environments should also be re-though in order to enhance the healthcare
settings’ integration and the transition of care.