Boštjan Žvanut

The effect of voluntariness on the acceptance of e-learning by nursing students.

Although e-learning is an innovation that is worth making generally available, it is not always accepted by nursing students. Many researchers state that voluntariness is closely related to the individual level of adoption of innovations. Hence, we hypothesized that voluntariness moderates the effect of perceived attributes of innovations (e.g. relative advantage, compatibility, complexity, trialability, and observability), which determines the acceptance of e-learning. To test the hypothesis a survey involving two groups of nursing students was carried out. For the first group the usage of e-learning was mandatory, for the second group it was optional. The results confirm our hypothesis. Institutions, interested in e-learning initiatives, should consider the effect of voluntariness when implementing e-learning. This paper provides a useful reference that can help e-learning providers to develop guidelines that can improve the acceptance of e-learning.

Students' Assessment and Self-assessment of Nursing Clinical Faculty Competencies: Important Feedback in Clinical Education?

The students’ assessment of clinical faculty competencies and the faculty members’ self-assessment can provide important information about nursing clinical education. The aim of this study was to identify the differences between the students’ assessment of the clinical faculty member’s competencies and the faculty member’s self-assessment. These differences can reveal interesting insights relevant for improving clinical practice.

Improving the Use of E-learning in Health Care Curricula: Presentation of best Practices

E-learning is nowadays included in different health care curricula. However, this learning and teaching approach is still relatively underused in the health care study programmes. Hence, the goal of this article is to present three e-learning best practices in health care, which were validated in our previous projects/studies.First best practice, e-learning practice contents for the development of critical thinking, presents the approach which resulted in significant (p<0.001) raise in the number of discussion posts (+12.2%) for which the opinions and conclusions of the participants were justified with valid arguments. Furthermore, also the survey results showed that students achieve critical thinking skills with these contents. Second best practice, inclusion of the health care students in the development of e-contents, also resulted as a valid approach for improving the use of e-learning in health care curricula, which was confirmed by the expert opinion and e-contents final users. Finally, third best practice, our approach for evaluation and comparison of e-learning and traditional pedagogical elements value by health care students and teachers, was confirmed in the interview with the management as a valid approach that helps the management to identify whether previous elearning initiatives and activities were successful. Best practices, presented in this paper, represent the evidence that the use of modern information and communication technologies should be considered in the future as a serious requisite in health care study programmes. The broader community interested in the e-learning initiative should prepare a list of similar best practices, validate its effectiveness and prepare guidelines for their optimal implementation..

A balanced scorecard-based model for evaluating e-learning and conventional pedagogical activities in nursing

The evaluation of e-learning and conventional pedagogical activities in nursing programmes has focused either on a single pedagogical activity or the entire curriculum, and only on students’ or teachers’ perspective. The goal of this study was to design and test a novel approach for evaluation of e-learning and conventional pedagogical activities that considers students’, teachers’ and managers’ perspectives. A case study of the proposed approach was performed at a publicly funded nursing faculty with Slovenian and Italian students from 2009 to 2012. The case study was combined with focus group discussions, interviews, direct observation and survey. The proposed approach allows management to compare the value of different pedagogical activities through the students’, teachers’ and managers’ perspectives. The approach proved useful in the evaluation of pedagogical activities and provided valid arguments for long-term pedagogical process improvement.

Deficiencies of business processes in health-care institutions: a case of ophthalmology outpatient clinic

Pomanjkljivosti Poslovnih Procesov v Zdravstvenih Organizacijah: Primer Okulistične Ambulante Namen: Razumevanje poslovnih procesov je ključni element pri prenovi poslovanja. Kljub temu pa mu v praksi slovenskega zdravstva namenjamo premalo pozornosti. Namen raziskave je pokazati, da je s pomočjo ustreznega popisa poslovnih procesov mogoče prepoznati neučinkovite elemente, ki povzročajo nevidne izgube v poslovanju. Metode: Uporabili smo so metodo pregleda literature, metodo opazovanja, metodo intervjuja in metodo modeliranja procesov ter v konkretni okulistični ambulanti popisali ključne poslovne procese s pomočjo dogodkovno vodenih procesnih verig ter ugotavljali pomanjkljivosti. Rezultati: Zaradi pomanjkljivosti v poslovnih procesih v konkretni okulistični ambulanti z dvema zaposlenima neracionalno izrabijo približno 25,5 ur delovnega časa na mesec (15,2 % celotnega delovnega časa na enega zaposlenega). Zaključek: Na podlagi ugotovitve, da so tolikšne pomanjkljivosti prisotne že v manjši zdravstveni organizaciji z dvema zaposlenima, lahko pričakujemo, da njihov obseg v kompleksnejših organizacijah še bistveno večji. Vodstvom zdravstvenih organizacij priporočamo, da omenjeni problematiki posvetijo posebno pozornost ter izvedejo popis in optimizacijo poslovnih procesov. Omenjene dejavnosti je potrebno izvesti pred uvedbo ali prenovo informacijskega sistema. Deficiencies of business processes in health-care institutions: a case of ophthalmology outpatient clinic Purpose: The key element of any business restructuring is understanding the business processes. Yet, the importance of these processes is underestimated in the Slovene healthcare system. The aim of this study is to show that inefficient business process elements, causing unseen losses, can be identified with the help of an appropriate business process inventory. Methods: The methods used in our study include literature search, direct observation, interviewing and process modelling. A direct observation study was conducted in an ophthalmology clinic, in which key business processes were modelled using Event-Driven Process Chains, and deficiencies in the business process were identified. Results: The opthalmology outpatient clinic, which employs two people, loses around 25.5 hours of working time per month (15.2% of the total working time of a full-time employee) because of deficiencies in its business processes. Conclusion: Considering that such deficiencies may be encountered in a small healthcare unit with only two employees, it can be expected that the losses will be significantly higher in more complex institutions. We suggest, given these findings, that the managements of healthcare institutions address these deficiencies by conducting business process inventories and optimising processes. These activities must precede the introduction or restructuring of the information system.