The benefits of debriefing as formative feedback in nurse education

Abstract

Objective: This paper explores the nursing literature to identify the educative process and essential features of debriefing.

Setting: Nursing education settings: undergraduate, postgraduate and professional development in nursing and midwifery.

Data sources: Studies of debriefing in nurse education were located in peer reviewed journals between 1990 and May 2010. Searches were made using keywords in six healthcare and one education database. Eleven nursing studies reporting education of individuals and six studies of teams were selected for inclusion; only one study provided learning outcome data. Hence, the literature was synthesised in a narrative form to include related studies.

Primary argument: Formative feedback is important in experiential learning and is often applied in nursing in the form of facilitated structured debriefing. Debriefing is most commonly reported in relation to clinical skills development and as part of individual and team‑based simulation training. Educational outcomes are dependant upon the skills of the facilitator in offering feedback in accordance with best practice. Although a key component of higher level education, there is a lack of published evidence with regard to the effectiveness of debriefing techniques in nurse education. A framework for debriefing practice is presented.

Conclusion: Structured facilitated debriefing is an important strategy to engage students in learning and is essential in simulation training. Further research is warranted to fully understand the impact of the method in nurse education.