Students’ Satisfaction, Confidence, and Experience With Mental Health Simulation in a Middle Eastern Nursing College: A Mixed-Methods Study

Abstract

Aims: Students are the center of the teaching and learning process, and simulation is a skill-oriented and student-centered learning strategy. The study’s objectives were to assess the students’ satisfaction and self-confidence after learning through simulation and explore their experience of mental health nursing simulation. Methods: The study employed an explanatory sequential mixed-methods approach, starting with a quantitative phase that used a descriptive survey to assess students’ perceived confidence and satisfaction with simulation-based learning in mental health. Data were collected from a pragmatic sample of 81 students using the Simulation Confidence and Learning Scale (SCLS). This was followed by a qualitative phase with a descriptive qualitative design, where six focus group interviews explored students’ perceptions of mental health simulation as a teaching strategy. A total of 48 students participated in the focus group interviews (eight students in each). The qualitative findings were used to explain and deepen the understanding of the quantitative results. Results: Most of the students were female (77.8%), and aged 21 years (64.2%). Most of them (62%) perceived high satisfaction and high self-confidence (50.62%) after the simulation practice. Students’ perceived satisfaction was independent of their gender (p = 0.373) and age (p = 0.237) but was associated with their cohort or year of study ((p = 0.005), whereas students’ perceived self-confidence was independent of their gender (p = 0.190), age (p = 0.598), and year of study (p = 0.530). Five themes and 14 subthemes emerged from the thematic analysis of the qualitative data. The themes were Overall simulation experience in mental health nursing, Advantages of simulated learning, Challenges of simulated learning, Simulation vs. Actual clinical experience, and Recommended simulated cases and duration. Conclusion: Simulated practice increased the confidence among the students for clinical practice, and students felt that supplementing actual clinical experience with simulated learning ensures equal opportunity to practice the rare clinical skills for all.