A Necessary Sea Change for Nurse Faculty Development: Spotlight on Quality and Safety

More than 10 years have passed since the publication of the Institute of Medicine's report, To Err is Human: Building a Safer Health Care System, yet recent reports indicate that significant strides toward transformational improvement in quality and patient safety are still necessary. Real progress toward superior health care quality requires foundational enhancements in health care education. An urgent need exists for undergraduate nursing programs to strengthen quality and safety knowledge in their curricula. A first step in attaining this goal is to equip baccalaureate nursing faculty with the knowledge, skills, and abilities needed to teach these concepts. The first part of this article provides a compelling case for new graduate nurses to have a comprehensive understanding of how quality and safety issues affect patient outcomes. The second part highlights the specific faculty competencies required to teach quality and safety to undergraduate nursing students and offers a framework that faculty can use for professional development in this area. This article is by no means exhaustive but provides a starting point for providing undergraduate nursing faculty with the knowledge, skills, and attitudes necessary to assist students to achieve quality and safety competencies in their curricula.

Index words: Quality, Patient safety, Nursing, Curriculum, Faculty development