Postoperative education, discharge instructions, and follow-up appointments provide a foundation for new ostomates after discharge, but a gap in care remains. New ostomates utilize resources twice as much as other colorectal patients. Virtual visits allow visual inspection of the patient while providing verbal support. The purposes of this project were to determine the feasibility of Virtual Postoperative Visits, to define specific issues patients want addressed, and to assess patient satisfaction with a virtual format. In this pilot project, 10 patients attended two outpatient virtual visits following hospital discharge. The virtual visits were conducted using video conferencing software. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze data from a survey assessing patient satisfaction; content analysis described video interactions. All patients successfully completed two virtual visits from their homes. Ninety percent felt these visits helped with ostomy management and agreed they should be part of a discharge plan. All patients felt comfortable with a virtual format. Common themes discussed included pouching and skin irritation. We found that virtual visits are feasible, and patients are satisfied with this format to address goals of care. Future work will focus on large-scale implementation of virtual visits for new ostomates.

Background: Nursing faculty sought to promote students' engagement with course material and their peers by using Kaizen, an online educational game. The purpose of this qualitative study was to learn more about nursing students' perceptions of team competition in an educational game and whether the game promoted their engagement with educational material in one fundamental nursing course. Method: Qualitative data collection included focus groups, observations of students, documents showing leaderboards and game participation, and “status of competition” e-mails. Data were transcribed and coded to determine emerging themes. Results: Four themes emerged from data analysis: learning in teams, motivators to play, learning course content, and suggestions for game improvement. Conclusion: Students were overwhelmingly positive about using a gamified platform for its educational rewards. They perceived that playing the game increased their knowledge retention, and they believed it helped them improve their test-taking skills. [ J Nurs Educ . 2019;58(2):79–85.]

In the United States, providing health care to critically ill patients is a challenge. An increase in patients older than 65 years, a decrease in critical care physicians, and a decrease in work hours for residents cause intensivist staffing issues. In this article, use of nurse practictioners to fill the intensive care unit intensivist staffing gap is assessed and evidence-based recommendations are identified to better incorporate nurse practitioners as part of intensive care unit intensivist staffing. The literature reveals that when nurse practitioners are part of a staffing model, outcomes are either positively impacted or no different from physician outcomes. However, successfully integrating nurse practitioners into an intensive care unit team is not adequately discussed in the literature. This gap is addressed and 3 mechanisms to integrate nurse practitioners into the intensive care unit are identified: (1) use of a multidisciplinary staffing model, (2) completion of onboarding programs, and (3) evaluation of nurse practitioner productivity.

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