Preparing psychiatric-mental health nurse practitioner students for patient death from suicide via standardized patient simulation

Abstract

There is limited literature on creating a simulated—trauma informed learning experience for psychiatric-mental health nurse practitioner (PMHNP) students to process patient suicide as a cause of death. Informed by the International Nursing Association for Clinical Simulation and Learning Standards of Best Practice and guidelines from the Suicide Prevention Resource Center and Stress First Aid for Healthcare Workers, a high-fidelity formative simulation-based patient suicide was developed and implemented. This manuscript conceptualizes an academic strategy to introduce the phenomenon of patient completed suicide to PMHNP students in a way that is trauma informed, therapeutic, evidence based, and application minded.