Communication for Professionals – Nursing Erasmus Project

Project Title

Communication for Professionals – Nursing

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships addressing more than one field

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2014

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses; Teaching and learning of foreign languages; Health and wellbeing

Project Summary

Nursing on the Move or NoM

PROFESSIONAL MOBILITY
In a globalised world linguistic and intercultural challenges have become part of professional life. Increasingly, healthcare has become a mobile profession and recruitment by developed countries to address domestic shortages intensifies the need for focused communication training (MoM 2012). In particular nurses are ‘on the move’ between countries, cultures and languages. Nursing on the Move or NoM tried to provide an answer to nurses’ needs, wants and wishes.

Since language-discordant medical professionals have become an inherent feature of clinical settings, problems with communicative functioning in the workplace should be effectively addressed. Misunderstandings between, for instance, nurses and patients with different cultural/linguistic backgrounds –related to verbal and non-verbal communication styles– have an adversary effect on perceived professional status (linguistic deficiencies can easily be interpreted as professional ‘un-qualification’). They can lead to rejection, stress, job dissatisfaction, burnout, drop out (Van Bogaert, 2009); and provoke drops in the quality of patient care and treatment failure. For mobile nurses, the working environment is a crucial column of social integration. Therefore, effective communication is considered essential to professional nursing practice (AACN, 1998) and the teaching/learning of good communication is central to nursing accreditation standards (CCNE, 2003).

The NoM-project AIMS and objectives
NoM aims to:
(1) support learners in vocational and adult education contexts;
(2) train nursing (pre-)professionals communication skills;
(3) facilitate nursing (pre-)professionals personal development, employability and high quality participation in the European labour market.

The NoM-OBJECTIVES:
(1) to establish an effective learning track for online/mobile autonomous/blended learning taking into account the learning styles of nurses and nurses-in-training and supporting their motivation through, eg. gamification strategies, multilingual audio/video cases and social network support in communities of good practice;
(2) to increase awareness for the need of multilingualism in the workplace, thus supporting linguistic diversity through an integration of language and nursing-related content. In its choice of target and interface languages NoM aims to sustain and increase the vitality of European languages;
(3) to improve the transparency and recognition of qualifications and competences through a well-developed system of badges, including those acquired through non-formal and informal learning, developing professional entrepreneurship and creating an optimal environment for lifelong learning in a European context.

Communicative COMPETENCE
NoM wants to increase nursing staff’s communication competences (CEFR level B) through dedicated communicative tasks with patient-centred care (eg. handing-out drugs, assistance with daily activities), diagnostic procedures (eg. measuring blood pressure), change of shift (introducing cases to colleagues), informal interactions with colleagues.

SCENARIOS
NoM provides scenario-based communication materials for nursing in five languages. Scenarios can be studied in an authentic task-based approach in preparation for clinical practice in a foreign environment (eg. exchange programme) or used in-service as a support tool to alleviate immediate needs (eg. foreign patients).

NoM-COMPONENTS
NoM-trainees improve their professional communication in an integrated way with the help of medical scenarios, on the basis of which focused attention is paid to (1) contextualised sounds, (2) language points, (3) written/audio wordlist and translations, and (4) intercultural communication skills. The communication skills guide offers hands-on conversation guidance, but also promotes awareness of cultural and linguistic diversity in a professional context and the need to combat racism, prejudice and xenophobia.
The materials in German (deu), Spanish (spa), Italian (ita), Dutch (nld) and Swedish (swe) (with support in ara, eng, fra, rus) are presented in online and mobile learning spaces. E-/blended learning is supported through forums. Models for training nurses and trainers has been tested.

EVALUATION
Pedagogical effect has been measured in different in-service language learning contexts. Evaluation was extremely positive and described NoM as a way forward in communication training. Achievement tests, questionnaire and tracking data have informed guidelines for training and supporting NoM-users.

IMPACT
NoM provides healthcare professionals with appropriate awareness and skills to interculturally communicate with multidisciplinary team members, patients and their families, which will improve the quality of their mobility and clinical work as well as their well-being and well-feeling as medical professionals.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 259147,5 Eur

Project Coordinator

UNIVERSITEIT ANTWERPEN & Country: BE

Project Partners

• Mutuam. Mutua de Previsió Social
• TAMPEREEN AMMATTIKORKEAKOULU OY
• Training 2000 psc
• Going International information services G. Polak KG
• DIE BERATER UNTERNEHMENSBERATUNGS GESELLSCHAFT MBH
• TeAM Hutchins Aktiebolag
• NOORDWES-UNIVERSITEIT