Impact of a Capacity-building Initiative for First-year Student Nurses on Reproductive and Sexual Health

Abstract

There is evidence of gaps in knowledge, perception and self-assessed competence on reproductive and sexual health (RSH) issues of nursing students. A quasi-experimental study was conducted in Bangalore city between January 2017–December 2018 to study the impact of a capacity-building initiative for 1st-year nursing students on their knowledge, perceptions, self-assessed competence and resilience. Eight nursing institutions were selected purposively; initially, four were allocated randomly through lottery method to the intervention group (IG) and four to the comparison group (CG). Since one institution dropped out before the intervention from IG, another institution was recruited to replace this institution. Both, the IG and CG, had seven batches of students (three diploma and four degree) each. A sample size of 120 students for each group was required. An investigator-developed and validated survey was administered to both groups at the start (pre-test) and 18 months after the start (post-test) of the study to assess their knowledge, perceptions and self-assessed competencies. Resilience was measured at the end of the study using a standardised tool, 'The Child Youth Resilience Measure'. A capacity-building initiative (31.5 h) which was participatory, contextualised and integrated life skills, was implemented for the IG over a period of 18 months. A condensed version of the programme (13.75 h) was provided to the CG over the same period. The analysis considered a total sample of 625 students (IG = 294; CG = 331) that participated in both, the pre-test and the post-test. Nursing students within both groups showed statistically significant improvement in their overall knowledge scores from pre-test to post-test (P < 0.01). However, the difference in the overall knowledge scores of IG and CG (between groups) was not statistically significant at the post-test (P = 0.076). There was a statistically significant increase in self-assessed competencies on RSH within both groups from pre-test to post-test (P < 0.001), but no statistically significant difference was seen between the two groups at post-test (P > 0.05). There was no significant difference (P > 0.05) in resilience scores between IG and CG at the post-test. The study is limited in that it could not measure competencies in the real-world setting. The study shows that changes in perceptions would require more time and possibly more practice and experience. Nevertheless, even condensed versions of such capacity-building initiatives could improve the overall knowledge and self-assessed competencies of nursing students.