Nurse educators use of scoring rubrics to determine varying levels of clinical performance in the perioperative setting

Thesis (M. Ed.) (Coursework)--University of Melbourne, 2005This research evolved out of the need to design and validate an instrument for the assessment of competencies within the specialised area of the Operating Suite. The study represents an attempt to develop an instrument underpinning the unit of competency NR 4 - The Instrument Nurse from the Australian College of Operating Room Nurses standards (2004). Both holistic and analytical rubrics were developed that were aligned to the ACORN Standard and underpinned by the Dreyfus (1981) model in accordance with the rules established by Griffin and colleagues (2001). Three video clips that captured the varying performances of instrument nurses in the operating suite were recorded and used as prompts for rating. Forty raters were required to judge the performance of the candidates in each video clip using an Analytical Observation Form, Holistic Performance Level Rubrics and Holistic Competence Rubrics. The study found that the holistic rubrics led to more consistent judgements than the analytical rubrics, yet the latter provided more diagnostic information for intervention purposes. Despite less consistency, the results revealed that the Analytical Observation Form had sufficient construct validity as determined by the Item Separation Index (Rasch, 1960). The study also revealed that the Analytical Observation Form had high internal consistency and greater inter-rater reliability when average ratings were used. The findings had direct implications for theory, practice and future research