Running head: NEW GRADUATE NURSES AND EFFECTS OF MENTORING 1

Running head: NEW GRADUATE NURSES AND EFFECTS OF MENTORING 1

 

Acknowledgements I would like to thank several people for their help and support in my quest to achieve the Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) degree. I would first like to thank Mary Kerich who served as my mentor and provided countless hours in guidance and encouragement to produce a quality project. Although you left the organization before I completed my project, you continued to be a support and offered your ongoing motivation to keep going. To Dr. Erica Brinkley who took on the role as my mentor towards the end, guiding, encouraging, and providing oversight of my project at a critical stage. To Dr. Clifford Mensah, thank you for the late-night calls, text messages, and email through which I received invaluable feedback. You availed yourself even when you were mourning the death of your father, thank you. To Drs. Judith Walloch and Sarah Silvest Guerrero, thank you for providing me with the time and valuable feedback in producing a quality work, and serving as faculty support on the committee to help complete my paper and earn my degree. To the rest of my direct faculty and advisors at Bradley University, you have been inspirational to me and I want to thank you for your commitment. I hope that your feedback, guidance and evaluations are demonstrated in this scholarly paper. To my husband, Ebenezer Asiem, thank you for your daily encouragement to not give up and keep on pushing to the end, you gave up so much to see me accomplish this. And finally, to my children Myron and Michael, thank you for giving me the time and space to accomplish this. You never complained when mom was unable to take you to certain events because of my tight writing and research schedules, however, you always gave me these positive smiles and cheers. Thank you for helping me achieve my goal.

NEW GRADUATE NURSES AND EFFECTS OF MENTORING 4 Abstract The first year of a new graduate nurse’s transition into professional nurse can be challenging. Supporting them in the transition to practice through training and mentoring could improve self-confidence, competence and retention. This project primarily seeks to assess improvements in the retention of new graduate nurses by introducing a mentorship program to augment the efforts of the Vizient Nurse Residency Program (NRP). The coupling of the two programs is expected to facilitate higher retention rates among new nurse graduates in the field. The preceptors of the new graduate nurses were trained to serve as mentors to new graduate nurses during, and beyond the initial orientation phase. Each new graduate nurse had access to a trained mentor at the unit level. All fifteen new graduate nurses participated in the Quality Improvement (QI) project and completed an intent- to- stay- within -twelve months- survey by the end of the QI project. The findings from this project suggests an improved retention of 80% within the first year of the new graduate nurse’s employment, yielding cost savings of $723,840 from 15 new graduate nurses salaries. In conclusion, the QI project found that intentional mentorship training for new graduate nurses’ preceptors and ongoing support, improve retention. The QI project found evidence in support of the effectiveness of coupling the two programs in the retention of new graduate nurses. However, further research quantifying the benefits of mentorship would provide further support for successful replication of the proposed model in similar programs. Keywords: new graduate nurse, retention, mentoring, nurse residency program. NEW GRADUATE NURSES AND EFFECTS OF MENTORING 5 Table of Contents Chapter I: Introduction ………………………………………………………………………........7 Background and Significance……………………………………………………………..8 Needs Assessment…………………………………………………………………………9 Problem Statement……………………………………………………………………….13 Project Aim…………………………………………………………………………........14 Clinical Question/PICOT……………………&helli

Order Now