Practice Rational Care Model: It’s Effect on Students’ Clinical Reasoning and Practical Skills at Maternity Nursing Department

Clinical reasoning is the dominant of clinical practice, strengthening nursing students' abilities to gather, analyze, and interpret information, leading to hypothesis generation. Crucially, it is necessary for patient safety and a vital component of nursing competence. Aim of the study: To evaluate the impact of the Practice Rational Care (PRC) model on the clinical reasoning and practical skills of students in the maternity nursing department. Study design: A quasi-experimental design was employed in this study. Setting: The study was conducted in the inpatient postnatal departments at Ain Shams Maternity University Hospital. Sample: simple random sampling method was utilized to select 66 maternal nursing students from a total of 266 students enrolled in the Maternal and Neonatal Health Nursing Department during the first semester of the 2024-2025 academic years. Tools of data collection: Three instruments were utilized in this study: a self-administered interview questionnaire, the Clinical Reasoning Assessment Tool (CRAT), and a rubric-based evaluation tool for clinical performance. Results: Prior to implementing the Practice Rational Care (PRC) model, 50.0% of the participants demonstrated a need to enhance their clinical reasoning skills. After implementation, 51.6% of the students exhibited strong clinical reasoning abilities. Additionally, 54.2% of the students showed unsatisfactory clinical practical skills before the intervention, whereas 62.5% achieved an excellent level of clinical practical skills following the PRC model implementation. Statistical analysis revealed a highly significant increase in the overall mean scores for clinical reasoning skills and the content knowledge subsection after applying the PRC model (P=0.002 and P=0.001, respectively). Moreover, there were significant improvements in the mean scores for procedural knowledge/psychomotor skills and the conceptual reasoning subsection post-intervention (P=0.01 for both).Conclusion: The implementation of the Practice Rational Care (PRC) model had a positive impact on the clinical reasoning and practical skills of maternity nursing students. Recommendations: It is recommended to integrate the Practice Rational Care model as an innovative teaching strategy within maternity nursing clinical education to enhance students' clinical reasoning abilities.