Dr Antonio Bonacaro
Title: The Impact of Mindfulness Meditation on Clinical Performance Accuracy in Adult Nursing Students in Simulated Learning: the Preliminary Results of a Primary Research Study
Biography:
Dr Antonio Bonacaro is a critical care nurse with a considerable experience in an international academic setting. Since 2000 Antonio has been teaching and researching in various countries including Italy, United Arab Emirates, Spain and Australia. Antonio completed his PhD in 2010 focusing on the benefits of the use of different types of simulation in undergraduate nursing education. Antonio’s research areas of interest are: clinical simulation in nursing education, holistic nursing, pain management, advanced technology, safety and quality of life and critical care nursing. He is currently working as a senior lecturer in adult nursing at Anglia Ruskin University, Chelmsford UK. He is conducting different research and income generation projects in collaboration with colleagues in the UK and Europe with a particular focus on the benefits of the use of wearable technologies in chronic patients.
Abstract:
A considerable part of nursing students’ training takes place in simulation laboratories where real-life clinical situations are replicated through guided learning experiences. The subjective experience of stress and anxiety can significantly reduce the quality of the teaching and learning experience, limit the quality of students’ performance and increase the probability of making mistakes that can compromise patients’ safety. Patients’ safety is paramount in any healthcare setting and clinical simulation associated to regular mindfulness meditation practice might help preventing adverse events and improve quality of care. In fact, mindfulness meditation is a technique that helps students develop skills of paying attention to themselves and the world in a non-judgemental manner and encourages compassion, acceptance and kindness which are values at the core of the nursing profession. A significant body of literature demonstrates the benefits of mindfulness meditation in terms of stress reduction, increased quality of sleep, increased self-regulatory processes of attention and emotion regulation. This presentation will discuss the preliminary results of an experimental study which explores the potential of mindfulness meditation in improving the accuracy of nursing students’ clinical performance while involved in a simulated clinical scenario based on a case of sudden cardiac death. For the purpose of this study six third year undergraduate nursing students took part in a 21-day mindfulness meditation training programme, delivered by a qualified instructor and adapted from the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Programme, devised by Jon Kabat-Zinn.