Nursing Handoff Education Using Experiential and Virtual Innovations

Background: Seventy percent of serious medical errors are the result of ineffective communication, including handoff errors. Problem: Nursing students have cited a need for more experience on how to give handoff; yet, handoff education remains variable. Approach: Two innovative curricular approaches were implemented on the basis of Bloom's taxonomy to teach handoff education: experiential and virtual. The outcomes of the 2 curricular innovations were evaluated for handoff completion, handoff accuracy, and handoff quality, based on context. Outcomes: During the experiential approach, students demonstrated average handoff completion rates of 84%. During the virtual approach, students' handoff completion rates rose from 25% to 63% and accuracy handoff rates rose from 13% to 31%. Conclusions: Evaluations support that varying educational methods successfully teach nursing students how to give handoffs. Complementary innovations grant educators flexibility to tailor innovations to curriculum and course context, as supported by Bloom's taxonomy.