Evaluation of ChatGPT artificial intelligence dialogues and simulated scenarios to prepare nursing students for telehealth practicum

Background: Telehealth care technologies and innovations will continue to expand and provide the means for improving quality and access to health care services. Respectively, the professional, research, academic, and leadership responsibilities include informing, educating, and resourcing future generations of health care providers for telehealth practices. Thus, an academic-practice partnership consisting of nursing faculty and Federally Qualified Health Center registered nurses co-facilitated a primary care telehealth practicum to prepare baccalaureate nursing students for practice. When the students expressed lack of confidence in conducting telephone calls with the patients, the faculty piloted a telehealth orientation that included simulated ChatGPT dialogues and virtual scenarios with motivational interviewing feedback. Aim: The purpose of the pilot project was to evaluate the combined effectiveness of artificial intelligence and virtual simulation scenarios in terms of increasing 32 senior level students’ perceived readiness and participation during telehealth practicums with faculty, primary care nurses, and enrolled patients. Methods: The Plan, Do, Study, Act framework was applied to develop, implement, and evaluate the pilot telehealth orientation. The project processes included students’ accomplishments of the following: pre-survey, simulated ChatGPT and virtual learning activities, reflection, and post-survey. The Special Projects of National Significance Program Cooperative Agreement Evaluation survey was applied to measure the students’ perceived abilities to counsel and manage clients. A combination of qualitative and quantitative methods was used to evaluate the students’ perceived gains related to telehealth facilitation skills, attitudes, and comfort. With consideration for the small sample size and non-normal data distribution, the Wilcoxon signed-ranks test was applied to determine the significance of students’ perceived skills, attitudes, and comfort gains. Results: Following completion of the telehealth orientation and simulations, the students’ perceived significant increases in abilities to counsel and manage clients' when providing telehealth services and overall knowledge of telehealth applications within the context of primary care. Conclusions: Combined simulation and live telehealth learning activities during prelicensure programs may be used to prepare future health care providers for practice in the Digital Era, and to measurably demonstrate value to the health care team and system by decreasing health care costs and increasing clients’ access to services.