For more than 29 years, Greene County Medical Center’s Acute nursing team has hosted LPN clinical training for Iowa Central Community College (ICCC) students. This year, nursing students from Des Moines Area Community College’s (DMACC) Carroll campus began their clinical training at Greene County Medical Center.
Director of Nursing Jess Weiss, BSN, RN, says offering the option of learning at a rural hospital brings about a broader view of the career options available to these nurses after graduation. “A lot of the time in school you only get to see nursing in the big hospital setting, not how a nurse functions in a small, critical access hospital,” she explained. “It is nice for them to see that in a critical access hospital we are the code team, the rapid response team and the trauma team.
We truly do get to do it all, which makes nurses in small rural hospitals well-rounded.”
During their clinicals, the students are partnered with a Greene County Medical Center nurse preceptor who shares their expertise. They work with the students on real-life assessments, medication distributions and other essential skills. “Our role is to help grow their knowledge,” Weiss said. “We make sure when we have nursing procedures, we allow the students to get in and perform them. We want them to do and learn as much as they can while they are here, helping to set them up for success in their career.”
According to Weiss, the learning is a two-way street. “Our nurses also learn more about working together as a team,” she said. “For example, the student completes head-to-toe care for the patient, then our nurse conducts a head-to-toe assessment to validate their work. This provides the opportunity to enhance their communication and teaching skills and if they notice anything incorrect in the documentation, they will reach out and explain the differences to the student, then show them the reason why it is different.”
The top priorities when teaching the DMACC and ICCC nursing students continue to include patient safety and the proper way to care for sick individuals in the hospital setting. “We are always excited to help guide and instruct our future nurses,” Weiss said. “But it is about more than just teaching them the practical skills they need to graduate and pass their NCLEX (National Council Licensure Examination). It is about sharing how rewarding this career can really be. We get to take care of people, helping them when they are sometimes at their lowest point, and we have the ability to make a positive impact on every patient we care for, every day.”
