Week 10 Assignment 2: Practicum Experience

As you are nearing the end of your practicum experience, consider the topics addressed this week.

Continue to keep track of your practicum hours using the Practicum Time Log and Journal document found in the Week 1 Resources area.

Plan to complete all required practicum hours by Day 7 of Week 10. Reflect on any feedback you have received from individuals in your practicum setting and complete your own self-reflection as you asses your practicum experience, including your professional growth, during this course. Integrate this evaluation into your final journal entry.

Also, note that you need to complete and submit an evaluation of your practicum experiences throughout the DNP Program to the Part 2 assignment link. In order to do a thoughtful reflection, begin preparing for that as soon as possible. Consider how your skills and knowledge have grown in the following areas as you prepare your self-evaluation:

Leadership

Advanced nursing practice

Promoting quality improvement

Improving health outcomes

Informing health care policy

Practicum Experience Evaluation

Complete your Practicum Experience Evaluation

Craft a response that addresses how your practicum experience impacted your progress. Consider how your skills and knowledge have grown in the following areas as you prepare for your self-evaluation.

Leadership
Consider to what extent your practicum experience throughout the DNP Program enhanced your ability to respond to organizational and system issues in health care. How prepared are you to assume a leadership role in the development of health policy? How confident do you feel in your ability to be an effective team leader and establish interprofessional teams? Are you prepared to provide leadership in the evaluation and resolution of ethical and legal issues? Reflect on how you may differ in these areas from when you first began your practicum experience.

Advanced Nursing Practice

Contemplate on how well your practicum experience helped you develop the advanced practice foundational competencies specified by the DNP Essentials.

Promoting Quality Improvement

Reflect on your proficiency in quality improvement strategies and in creating and sustaining changes at the organizational and policy levels. Think about your ability to use information systems and technology to implement quality improvement initiatives. Specify how your proficiency in these areas changed throughout your practicum experience.

Improving Health Outcomes

Analyze changes in your abilities to guide improvements in practice and outcomes of care. Consider your skills in educating others (including policy makers) to improve patient care outcomes. Contemplate your competency in developing and sustaining therapeutic relationships with patients and other professionals to facilitate optimal care and patient outcomes.

Informing Health Care Policy

Think about how your practicum experience has prepared you to design, influence, and implement health care policies that frame health care financing, practice regulation, access, safety, quality, and efficacy. Reflect on changes in your ability to critically analyze health policy proposals, health policies, and related issues from the perspective of consumers, nursing, other health professions, and other stakeholders in policy and public forums.