- College of Nursing - Michigan State University

The State of Michigan faces unprecedented challenges in meeting the health care needs of its citizens. The growing needs for anesthesia providers, particularly, nurse anesthetists, are well documented in the health service literature. This new proposal clearly addresses the legislative purpose to “prepare advanced education nurses through the enhancement of advanced nursing education and practice” and addresses several high priority areas in the Bureau of Health Professions (BHPr) National Goals I and II, Kids into Health Careers, and Healthy People 2010 (HP 2010) with Linkages. The primary purposes of this unique and innovative proposal are to increase workforce capacity by combining unique and innovative learning objectives and content specific learning material in an inventive 3-D virtual format focused on the unique needs of diverse students and those seeking Nurse Anesthesia education. Additionally, this proposal seeks partial support to augment and reinforce the currently available simulation aids of the MSN Nurse Anesthesia Program at MSUCON so that graduates are equipped with the preparation and skills to practice in rural and medically underserved areas by substituting and/or augmenting real patient experiences with guided experiences, artificially contrived, that suggest or replicate substantial aspects of the real world in a fully interactive manner. The 4 main objectives for this project include:

Objective 1: Enhance the MSN Nurse Anesthesia Program candidate pool by recruiting and training students who are inclined to work with “at-risk” populations in rural and medically underserved areas (MUAs); (BHPr National Workforce Goal I; HP-2010; Linkages); Objective 2: Increase the diversity of the student body in the Nurse Anesthesia Program at MSU through targeted advertising and outreach, directed towards African American, Hispanic, and other minority nurses, in professional associations, regions, nursing schools and electronic media  who are committed to practice in rural/MUAs in central, northern and western Michigan; (BHPr National Workforce Goal II; Linkages); Objective 3: Provide modern educational, curricular, and learning facilities with a current emphasis on the HP-2010 and BHPr objectives which impact the health care outcomes of medically underserved target populations; (BHPr National Workforce Goal II; HP-2010; Linkages); Objective 4:  Design and implement a service project to increase the public’s knowledge and make geographically disadvantaged students aware of opportunities for nurse anesthesia as a career choice. (Kids into Health Careers)

Just as underserved, economically disadvantaged and ethnically or culturally marginalized communities suffer due to lack of primary health care services, so do they suffer from lack of familiarity and access to opportunity for providers to maintain and improve certain skills. This proposal will combine unique and innovative learning objectives and content specific learning material to students and practitioners in rural and other underserved areas offering these anesthesia providers opportunities to work in an inventive 3-D virtual format and with high-fidelity simulation which can contribute to increased services for their service populations.

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