High school students learn nursing skills at Nursing and Healthcare Academy
Brittany Buhlig |
The heart, blood pressure, CPR … these are just a few of the things high school students learned through hands-on experience at Lipscomb University’s Nursing and Healthcare Academy held July 6-10.
The week-long academy introduced rising 8th through 12th grade students to basic nursing and healthcare skills. Supervised by registered nurses, the students used nursing instruments to learn the “basics” of the profession from taking blood pressure and using a stethoscope to monitoring heart rhythms and learning healthy habits.
Not only were students given the exact tools that real nurses use and shown how to use them, they also learned the science behind the tools and why the body operates the way it does.
“While I am not a nurse by trade, I do have a doctorate in clinical chemistry and have always been interested in all aspects of healthcare for many years,” said Mike Fowler, associate professor of pharmaceutical sciences at Lipscomb and mentor for the Nursing Academy.
“I’m showing these kids how to take blood pressure and also what the science is behind it so they can get a chance to be familiar with the nursing field. I also just want them to experience how exciting it is to hear the blood pump.”
As the capstone of their learning experience, the students toured Centennial Medical Center to witness the skills they learned and practiced being put into action. While many prospective nurses don’t become familiar with nursing skills until college, the patient care simulations and tours were tailored to meet the unique learning needs of the students while giving them the opportunity to become acquainted with nursing skills before entering college.
“I have an aunt who is a nurse and it always seemed interesting to me,” said Shelby Sutton, a junior from Dickson. “Being able to care for people seems like a challenging yet fulfilling career and the academy is providing me with a great opportunity to experience it firsthand.”
The demand for nurses in Tennessee is expected to exceed supply by 9,500 over the coming years. Exposing today’s teens to the attractive career options in nursing and other health care professions has become a popular trend among universities.
“Given its long-standing success in educating doctors and scientists, Lipscomb University saw the Nursing Academy as a way to bring its expertise in science to an additional group of students: high school and middle school students interested in nursing,” said Ben Hutchinson, dean of the Lipscomb College of Natural and Applied Sciences. “The university established its own bachelor’s degree in nursing six years ago, and the university’s nursing students and graduates will mentor participants in the summer nursing and health care academy.”
Academy students received notebooks that they used to record activities throughout the camp. Once the notebooks are completed, the students can keep them as evidence of their experience at the Nursing and Healthcare Academy and all of the skills and knowledge they have acquired.
“It has been really informational and also a lot of fun getting to use the blood pressure machine,” says Sutton. “I’m just hoping to learn all that I can because I really want to do this for a living.”