• Heather S Laird-Fick, David Solomon, Christine Jodoin, Francesca C Dwamena, Kim Alexander, Larry Rawsthorne, Tammy Banker, Nandu Gourineni, Feras Aloka, Richard M Frankel, and Robert C Smith.
• Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA.
• Patient Educ Couns. 2011 Jul 1; 84 (1): 90-7.

ObjectiveTo train medical residents and nurses to work together as a patient-centered care (PCC) team on a medical ward and test its feasibility, nurses' learning, and patient outcomes.MethodWorking with administrative leadership, we consolidated residents' patients on one 32-bed ward. Already training residents in an evidence-based patient-centered method, we now trained 5 nurse leaders similarly, and they then trained all staff nurses. A national consultant visited twice. Specific team-building activities for nurses and residents fostered ward interactions. We used a retrospective pre/post/6-month post-design to evaluate nurses' knowledge and self-efficacy of patient-centered skills. Patients were assigned non-randomly to our unit or comparison units from our emergency room; using a post-test only design, the primary endpoint was patient satisfaction.Results28 trained nurses showed improvement in knowledge (p=0.02) and self-efficacy (p=0.001). 81 treatment patients showed no improvement in satisfaction (p=0.44).ConclusionTraining nurses in patient-centered practices were effective. Unique in this country, we also trained nurses and residents together as a PCC team on a medical ward and showed it was feasible and well accepted.Practice ImplicationsWe provide a template for team training and urge that others explore this important new area and contribute to its further development.Copyright © 2010 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

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