Congruence of perceived effective clinical teaching characteristics between students and preceptors of nurse anesthesia programs.

This study continues landmark research, by Katz in 1984 and Hartland and Londoner in 1997, on characteristics of effective teaching by nurse anesthesia clinical instructors. Based on the literature review, there is a highlighted gap in research evaluating current teaching characteristics of clinical nurse anesthesia instructors that are valuable and effective from an instructor's and student's point of view. This study used a descriptive, quantitative research approach to assess (1) the importance of 24 characteristics (22 effective clinical teaching characteristics identified by Katz, and 2 items added for this study) of student registered nurse anesthetists (SRNAs) and clinical preceptors, who are Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetists, and (2) the congruence between the student and preceptor perceptions. A Likert-scale survey was used to assess the importance of each characteristic. The study was conducted at a large Midwestern hospital. The findings of this study did not support the results found by Hartland and Londoner based on the Friedman 2-way analysis. The rankings of the 24 characteristics by the students and the clinical preceptors in the current research were not significantly congruent based on the Kendall coefficient analysis. The results can help clinical preceptors increase their teaching effectiveness and generate effective learning environments for SRNAs.