Manikin fidelity: effect on nursing students’ satisfaction and self-confidence

Abstract Objective To compare the effect of the manikin in the simulation on levels of satisfaction and self-confidence with the learning of undergraduate nursing students in relation to the administration of intravenous medication to critically ill patients. Methods Randomized, parallel, double-blind clinical trial. Study participants were allocated to the Experimental Group (high-fidelity manikin) and Control Group (low-fidelity manikin) and exposed to the simulation session. Before, immediately after and 30 days after the simulation, students filled out the Student Satisfaction and Self-Confidence in Learning Scale. The Mann Whitney, Chi-square, Wilcoxon test and Fisher’s exact statistical tests were used. A significance level of 5% was adopted, with results considered significant with a p-value ≤ 0.05. Results 60 students were evaluated (31 in the Experimental Group and 29 in the Control Group). There was a significant reduction in satisfaction (p = 0.02) and self-confidence (p < 0.001) over the 30-day period in the control group. In the experimental group, levels of satisfaction and self-confidence were maintained in the different stages of the study. Conclusion The high fidelity of the manikin was not effective for the development of non-technical skills such as satisfaction and self-confidence when compared to low fidelity in the administration of intravenous medications to critically ill patients by nursing students. ClinicalTrials.gov register: NCT03828526