Mindfulness-Based Educational Module for Nurses Caring for Pediatric Mental Health Patients

BACKGROUND: Emergency pediatric nurses have the added stress of not only caring for medical patients but must also care for patients experiencing mental health issues. Many nurses feel unprepared to care for this specialized patient population. To bridge this gap, mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) have been shown to provide nurses with the skills needed to care for mental health patients. This same concept can be applied to pediatric patients. Pediatric-focused mindfulness-based techniques can be used to help pediatric patients manage their symptoms.

LOCAL PROBLEM: The setting for this project was an urban pediatric emergency department in East Tennessee. At the state and national level, there is a lack of available inpatient psychiatric beds for children requiring higher level of care. This has contributed to longer lengths of stay for patients holding in pediatric emergency departments. The purpose of this evidence-based practice project was for pediatric emergency room nurses to participate in a computer-based educational module that teaches implementing pediatric-focused MBIs in a pediatric setting.

METHODS: The Johns Hopkins Evidence-Based Practice Model and Lewin’s 3-Step Change Theory were used to guide this project’s development, plan, and intervention implementation. Pre-module, immediate post-module, and 1-month post-module self-reports were measured with the use of the C-Scale Confidence Tool.

INTERVENTIONS: To best determine the impact of this intervention, nurse confidence was measured using the C-Scale Confidence tool. Nurses’ self-reports before and after the intervention were collected to see if there was an improvement in their confidence in caring for pediatric mental health patients.

RESULTS: Nurses' self-reports showed an increase in nursing confidence after the implementation of a mindfulness-based educational module. Self-report nursing confidence scores increased from mean confidence of 3.18 to 4.13 (pre-module compared to the 1-month follow-up evaluation).

CONCLUSIONS: Use of a mindfulness-based educational module resulted in a significant increase in nursing confidence when caring for pediatric mental health patients.