THE EFFECT OF OUTCOME - BASED EDUCATION IN CLINICAL COMPETENCY NURSE TRAINING IN TABRIZ NURSING AND MIDWIFERY FACULTY

Promoting clinical education quality requires use of effective methods. Outcome-based education (OBE) is an educational reform movement that has influenced many countries in recent years. Despite the global acceptance of outcome-based education, the research documents are fairly rare about its effects on student's competency. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of outcome-based education program on clinical competency (cognitive skills and behaviors skill) of nursing students on hemodialysis ward.

In a quasi-experimental study using pre-test and post-test with two group design, 26 nursing students were selected through census sampling method and placed randomly in 2 control and 2 experiment groups, each group containing 6 to 7 people. After taking the cognitive skills pre-tests, control group received traditional education and experiment group went under clinical education using outcome-based education program for 9 days. As the final step, the post-test cognitive skills were held and behaviors skill checklist were observed. The data were analyzed using SPSS software using Wilcoxon and Mann Whitney tests and fisher exact test.

The outcome-based education has been effective in promoting the cognitive and behavioral skills of students. The mean scores significantly differed before and after participating in outcome-based education and the clinical competency of nursing students in outcome-based education groups differed significantly from traditional groups.

The effect of outcome-based education program on competency of nursing students was more than the traditional methods. Therefore, it is recommended to use outcome-based education in clinical education.