The effect of symptom management training in palliative care with micro teaching method enriched with standard patient on nursing students' knowledge, reflective thinking level and therapeutic communication skills

This study was conducted to determine the effect of symptom management training in palliative care using micro-teaching method enriched with standard patient on nursing students' knowledge, reflective thinking and therapeutic communication skills towards palliative care. The study was conducted as a randomized controlled pre-test, post-test intervention study with 40 volunteer students studying in the last year in the department of nursing. In the study, "Descriptive Characteristics Form", Palliative Care Knowledge Test, "Scale for Determining the Level of Reflective Thinking" and "Therapeutic Communication Skills Scale for Nursing Students" were used. In the study, "Micro Instruction Group Evaluation Form" and "Standard Patient Practice Evaluation Form" were used in the intervention group. The preparation process includes the training of the expert group, preparation of the environment and the pre-intervation. In the implementation process, the intervention group and the control group were handled separately. In the study, the intervention group received the micro-teaching method enriched with the standard patient online twice with a one-week interval, while the control group received a palliative care information brochure for the patient's relatives. While 85.0% of the students participating in the study were female, the mean age of the participants was 22.13±0.82 years. As a result of the statistics, it was determined that the groups had similar characteristics (p>0.05). In the study, while there was no significant difference between the results of the knowledge test for palliative care (p>0.05), there was a significant group*time interaction between the groups in terms of reflective thinking skills scores (p<0.05), the difference between the intervention group's in-group interactions was significant, and there was a significant difference in the mean scores of the therapeutic communication skills scale of the intervention and control groups according to the time factor. When the sub-dimensions of the reflective thinking skills scale were evaluated, it was determined that there was a significant difference in the sub-dimensions of understanding, reflection and critical reflection (p<0.05). When the sub-dimensions of the therapeutic communication skills scale were evaluated, it was concluded that there was a significant difference in the therapeutic-1 sub-dimension. In conclusion, symptom management training in palliative care using micro-teaching method enriched with standardized patient can improve students' reflective thinking and therapeutic communication skills.