gms | German Medical Science

Background: The midwives who provide practical guidance play an important role within the legally stipulated practical guidance in professional practice assignments. Due to the required continuing education and the annual professional pedagogical training on pedagogical-didactic methods of knowledge transfer and competence development as well as the current scientific discourse, they have a special mediator role in the respective inter- and intradisciplinary teams. A special field of action is to make the contents of practical training and the development of student competencies visible to the other colleagues involved in academic midwifery training and to transport them into the clinical settings.

Aim/question: A dynamic overview board was developed to answer the question of how colleagues from the teams in the areas of deployment can best maintain an overview of the complexity of practice content of several cohorts running in parallel with different deployment times and individual competence developments, and to enable a continuous exchange of information: PAL-Heb-Board^©.

Methodology: The PAL-Heb-Board^©, based on the Kanban Board, uses movable magnets, symbols, photos of the students and current information for all service participants. Flexible customization regarding practice guidance, individual weekly learning goals, and caseload status is supported. Previously completed assignment times are also visualized for the skill area.

Results: The first dynamic PAL-Heb-Board^© was developed as a prototype and piloted and adapted on the topic of clinical reasoning in an academic practice site in the delivery room. The results of a first feed-back survey from the clinical practice and the students involved so far, show a very positive response. Students are addressed by name, individual competence developments and self-formulated learning objectives are better taken into account by colleagues in further services, and practice instructions can be carried out more effectively.

Relevance: A transparent presentation of contents and competence levels is not only important in the context of information exchange between different parties involved, but especially for decision making and task distribution in emergency management. In addition, the current and future team identity of the students is promoted and an over/under-demand of the students, especially in emergency situations, is counteracted.

Recommendations/conclusion: The PAL-Heb-Board^© offers the possibility to make complex professional practice processes visible and applicable within the operational areas. To show the work of the practice guiding midwives and an appreciative identity development of the students in the team are the overall goals. Based on the flexibility it can be used for other health professions.

Ethics and conflicts of interest: A vote on ethics was not necessary. The research was financed by own resources. There are no conflicts of interest.