임상실습 전 임상수행능력평가(CPX)가 간호대학생의 핵심기본간호술 자신감과 비판적 사고능력에 미치는 효과

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of preclinical clinical performance examination (CPX) on nursing students’ confidence in their nursing skills and critical thinking competence. Methods: The design of this research was one-group pretest-posttest, and the participants were 112 nursing students. The preclinical CPX consisted of a clinical examination, patient-nurse relationship, oral test of related knowledge, written test of the nursing process, and debriefing using comprehensive scenarios based on real patient cases. The confidence of nursing skills consisted of an 8-item NRS and the critical thinking competence consisted of a 12-item 4-point scale developed by researchers and measured in both the pretest and posttest. The collected data were analyzed using paired t-tests, ANOVA, and Pearson correlation coefficients. Results: The score for confidence in nursing skills (t=10.60, p<.001) and that for critical thinking competence (t=7.03, p<.001) increased significantly after preclinical CPX. Conclusion: This study showed that preclinical CPX was effective in improving nursing students’ confidence in their nursing skills and critical thinking competence. Therefore, preclinical CPX is expected to be utilized in nursing practice education. Additional studies including those on control groups are recommended to compare differences between the preclinical CPX group and control group.