Innovation in nursing education – the perceptions of the undergraduate students

Introduction: Technological development, robotics and artificial intelligence are modulating an abrupt change in the clinical contexts. Healthcare professionals must be prepared to monitor and provide care in the digital health era meeting quality of care and patient safety’ standards. Despite these advances, evidence suggests that most higher education institutions lack aspects related to innovation and entrepreneurship, contributing for the academy-practice gap and potentially jeopardizing future health professionals’ competencies to address these challenges in a fast and changing health work environment.
Goal and Methods: This qualitative and descriptive study aimed to understand students' perceptions regarding institutional transformation in innovation and entrepreneurship. Thirty-four undergraduate nursing students participated in a matchmaking event on entrepreneurship and innovation in health. Using the Gallery Walk technique, which allows students to discuss the topic actively, they had to answer a set of meaningful questions on the subject, related not only to their perception about it, but also to the knowledge, tools and environment needed to increase innovation and entrepreneurship-related competencies.
Results: An emergent change in curricula is needed for students, allowing the participation in innovative projects and promoting a more active methodology encouraging students to think ‘out of the box’. Simultaneously, the participants demand interprofessional education with other areas, like engineering, to develop common disciplines under standard curricula and to broad their areas of competency.
Conclusions: Students are aware that education has not kept up with technological advances in the health area, limiting the development of innovation and entrepreneurship competencies. A collaborative intervention in the era of health 4.0 involving academy, practice, research, and the business community is needed to streamline the generation of specialized products targeting peoples’ needs.