Evaluation and quality improvement of Doctor of Nursing Practice-Family Nurse Practitioner scholarly projects.

Background: The Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education's accreditation standards require nursing programs to demonstrate that students acquire doctoral-level knowledge and competencies beyond that expected at the baccalaureate and/or masters levels. The purpose of this article was to describe a quality improvement (QI) project for Doctor of Nursing Practice-Family Nurse Practitioner (NP) scholarly projects.

Local problem: Nurse practitioner faculty inquired about whether students' scholarly projects were of the quality and rigor expected at the doctoral, rather than masters, level.

Methods: This project was conducted as a QI initiative and was designated as such by the institutional review board. Methods were based on Deming Plan-Do-Study-Act QI process model.

Interventions: Two doctorally prepared nursing faculty evaluated nine doctoral scholarly projects using the Roush DNP-PCAT instrument. This instrument evaluates 16 components, and key elements within each component, for completeness. The DNP-PCAT tool was evaluated for interrater reliability and content validity in an earlier study.

Results: Strengths and weaknesses were identified using quantitative and qualitative data analyses. Floor effects were seen in strategic planning, ethical concerns, data collection, results, discussion, and limitations. Qualitative findings identified weaknesses across all 16 components. Findings were similar to the results reported in a prior study. Results were reviewed and action plans were developed to improve the rigor of scholarly projects.

Conclusions: The nursing faculty plan to incorporate routine evaluation of scholarly projects into their program evaluation. Other NP programs may benefit from instituting a similar process.