Kristine M. Talley, PhD, CNP, RN, is an associate professor in the School of Nursing at the University of Minnesota. She is also a member of the Minnesota Northstar Geriatrics Workforce Enhancement Program (MN Northstar GWEP) Administrative Core, a group of experts who manage MN Northstar GWEP activities and work with community partners to direct projects. In this interview, Dr. Talley provides an overview of the MN Northstar GWEP-created geriatric toolkits and how they can serve educators in healthcare disciplines.
Can you tell us about your role and how you became involved in helping to create the geriatric toolkits?
I am an associate professor in the School of Nursing at the University of Minnesota. I'm also a certified gerontological nurse practitioner, and I have taught for over a decade in our nurse practitioner program. I teach courses on advanced nursing care of older adults.
My colleagues and I noticed that a lot of health-focused programs are a hybrid between online and face-to-face courses. Instructors are looking for quality educational material that they could use in an online class, particularly related to geriatric topics. That's why we created these toolkits.
Can you tell us more about the geriatric toolkits and how the need originated?
Each toolkit addresses a common geriatric condition in older people, and there are two components to each one. There's a digital learning module that is available free via open access on the Internet. Educators can simply send students the URL, and students can go through that module, get the basics of the topic, and potentially learn a new skill. The need for these toolkits came from very high demand for good-quality online digital learning geriatrics content that's engaging for students.
A second component of the toolkit is intended for people who maybe aren't experts in geriatrics within their field, but they need to teach geriatric content. There is a list of resources for educators. Examples include case studies that instructors can assign to students to assess their learning of the material, a list of current practice guidelines or current readings on the topic, or a link to patient education material. In essence, each toolkit has a learning module that's designed for a student in addition to a list of other resources that an educator can use to create their own lesson plan.
What is the end goal in getting these toolkits to students and instructors?
We know that not every healthcare program has standalone courses in the care of older adults. Consequently, we are trying to fill a gap in geriatrics education. Our goal is to help increase the knowledge base for people who might be assigned to teach geriatrics care when they don't necessarily have that expertise. Hopefully, educators from many disciplines find these toolkits useful to put into their coursework to help train their students so that they don't have to come up with all this content on their own.
What is the process for ensuring that all the educational content is current and approved by healthcare experts?
The audience for these toolkits is meant to be interprofessional—they are for learners in medicine, nursing, pharmacy, social work, and many others. Because of this, we are focusing on topics that would work for multiple disciplines while making sure there is content relevant for multiple disciplines.
To ensure we meet all standards, we have a group of faculty that are in many disciplines, including medicine, nursing, social work, physical therapy, pharmacy, and even dentistry. They all review the material in the initial drafts so that it is fully peer-reviewed. In this way, we know that it is high-quality information. These subject matter experts also help provide resources or potential information that would be relevant for their discipline.
Can you tell us about the community advisory board that you work with to create these geriatric toolkits?
The Minnesota Northstar Geriatrics Workforce Enhancement Program (MN Northstar GWEP) community advisory board listens to our ideas for toolkits and provides feedback on whether they think that is something important for health-professions students to learn about. On occasion, if we need an expert reviewer for a topic that may require outside review, the board members review the content to make sure that it addresses current workforce needs. Mainly, the community advisory board serves to vet topics and provide approval prior to development of the geriatric toolkits.
Are there any other guiding principles for how you and the team are creating the geriatric toolkits?
Yes. We are following a national initiative called the four Ms of Age-Friendly care. We are making sure that we include topics that align with the four Ms of geriatrics, which are mentation, mobility, what matters, and medication use.
So far, we've created one each for mobility, what matters, and medication use. Soon we will launch a toolkit specific to mentation. Mentation refers to cognitive impairment, delirium, and dementia.
At the same time, we are tackling the urgent need to teach learners about working with diverse older populations. In the future we will have a toolkit about creating LGBTQ-friendly practices. We are also hopeful that we'll launch a toolkit on how to work with older Asian-Americans. One of our overriding goals is to create educational content related to underrepresented populations in aging.
If educators or others are interested in exploring these toolkits, how would they find them?
We have a website that lists all the available educational products, mngwep.nexusipe.org/toolkits. We are proud of the fact that it is all open access. Users do not have to create an account or log in to use it. We wanted it to be as easy to access as possible. Folks can simply glance at the toolkits quickly to see whether they will be relevant for their students. Upon deciding that it would be valuable for their students, they can just copy the URL for the learning module and put that URL in the teaching material for students to access.
Then there is also a list of related resources. If an educator is looking to develop an entire lesson plan, they may go in there and find material that's useful and relevant, such as readings or case studies that instructors can use in a discussion or a graded assignment.
About the Minnesota Northstar GWEP
The purpose of the Minnesota Northstar Geriatrics Workforce Enhancement Program is to improve the health and healthcare of older adults across Minnesota. It is supported by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the primary federal agency for improving health care for people who are geographically isolated and economically or medically vulnerable. The contents are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the official views of, nor an endorsement, by HRSA, HHS or the U.S. Government. The Minnesota Northstar GWEP is also supported by the Otto Bremer Trust, the University of Minnesota Medical School and the Office of Academic Clinical Affairs.