Assessing Readiness and Effectiveness to Learning with a Smartphone Application

Abstract

Purpose: The purpose of this project is to improve and explore the modalities of how intensivecare nurses at Northwest Medical Center access knowledge and information about infrequently used equipment through an educational smartphone application. Background: Annual in-person training on infrequently used equipment was limited for nursing staff because of COVID19 pandemic. This limitation emphasized that online learning, with its schedule flexibility, is becoming a standard for education. Smartphone use has shown improvement with knowledge-based testing, allowing high level of flexibility with mobile and on-demand accessibility. Thus, development of an educational smartphone application for easier access to training materials for practicing nurses is recommended to expand and refresh knowledge. Methods: This project used descriptive quantitative design with surveys and pretesting/post testing to assess readiness and effectiveness of learning how to set-up, implement, manage, and maintain HotLine© blood warmer from smartphone application for intensive-care nurses. Pretest/posttest was evaluated with a paired t-test. Results: There were 40 intensive-care nurse participants, of which 38 completed data collection surveys. Of the participants, 36.11% responded asking co-workers for assistance and referring to policies/procedures is current process to set up and operate infrequently used devices. Half of participants showed indifference with current support or process to operate infrequently used equipment. Study participants also indicated there are barriers to learning. Most comfortable method of learning was 1:1 for 42.5% of participants. An overwhelming majority of participants, 91%, agreed they are likely or highly likely to use smartphone application as bedside resource on 10 readiness assessment. Pretest/posttest showed increased knowledge with smartphone intervention as the initial scores were 36.5% ±2.34, and the post scores increased to 84.5% ±2.87. The smartphone application showed a significant improvement of post scores after intervention (p < 0.0001). Conclusions: There was significant improvement in the knowledge of the intensive care nurse participants to operate the level 1 hotline blood warmer following the use of the educational smartphone application. Readiness assessment showed that an overwhelming majority of study participants would use the smartphone application as a bedside resource. These results confirmed that the smartphone application is a viable, accessible, and accepted educational training resource that increases knowledge.