Abstract
Background/aims: The World Health Organisation has identified that with ageing populations on the rise improving palliative care through education is a global priority. One means for achieving this is through the use of the creative arts to promote new discussions about the social determinants of end of life care. The graphic novel Vivian was created to raise awareness of gender and palliative care. The aim of this project is to explore undergraduate student nurses’ views regarding the usefulness of Vivian as a teaching tool about gender and palliative care in undergraduate nursing curricula in Aotearoa New Zealand, England, and Sweden.
Methods: Focus groups (either in-person or online) were held with 2nd and 3rd year nursing students in the three countries. Data were jointly analysed by the cross-national project team, using thematic analysis.
Results: Student nurses in the three different cultural contexts felt that Vivian, and other graphic novels, could be useful additions to the undergraduate nursing curriculum. The combination of images and text were seen as more engaging than text-based instruction alone. The images also prompted a critical, empathetic reflection on the content. They humanised the story, thereby aiding comprehension and recall about the issues related to gender and palliative care. More attention to the storyline in future graphic novels could help with reader engagement.
Conclusions: Arguments for using the arts to represent research include their ability to foster a deep engagement with audiences as well as their potential for conveying alternative forms of knowledge beyond information transfer. In this sense, Vivian speaks to the potential of graphic novels to provide a means for engaging with undergraduate nursing students about topics of importance to the palliative and end of life care curriculum. They offer an alternative to heavily text-driven resources. The project was funded by the U21 Health Sciences Research Fund.
Methods: Focus groups (either in-person or online) were held with 2nd and 3rd year nursing students in the three countries. Data were jointly analysed by the cross-national project team, using thematic analysis.
Results: Student nurses in the three different cultural contexts felt that Vivian, and other graphic novels, could be useful additions to the undergraduate nursing curriculum. The combination of images and text were seen as more engaging than text-based instruction alone. The images also prompted a critical, empathetic reflection on the content. They humanised the story, thereby aiding comprehension and recall about the issues related to gender and palliative care. More attention to the storyline in future graphic novels could help with reader engagement.
Conclusions: Arguments for using the arts to represent research include their ability to foster a deep engagement with audiences as well as their potential for conveying alternative forms of knowledge beyond information transfer. In this sense, Vivian speaks to the potential of graphic novels to provide a means for engaging with undergraduate nursing students about topics of importance to the palliative and end of life care curriculum. They offer an alternative to heavily text-driven resources. The project was funded by the U21 Health Sciences Research Fund.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 136-137 |
| Number of pages | 2 |
| Journal | Palliative Medicine |
| Volume | 37 |
| Issue number | 1S |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 7 Jun 2023 |
| Event | 18th EAPC World Congress - Rotterdam, Netherlands Duration: 15 Jun 2023 → 17 Jun 2023 |