NCSBN launches the Next Generation NCLEX exam.
A nurse’s ability to think more critically and make the right decisions is now part of the National Council Licensure Examination (NCLEX).
The Next Generation NCLEX (NGN) is an enhancement of the prevailing NCLEX, using real-world case studies to measure a nurse's ability to think more critically and make the right decisions, according to the National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN).
At the core of this enhanced exam is the NCSBN Clinical Judgment Measurement Model (NCJMM), developed by NCSBN researchers as a framework for the measurement of clinical judgment and decision-making within the context of a standardized examination.
“While clinical judgment and decision-making have been important elements in most prelicensure education programs for many years, significant research and development were required to isolate and measure these traits with psychometric rigor,” according to the NCSBN.
To create the measurement model, which is more than a decade in the making, NCSBN researchers first drew upon the prevailing literature in nursing, nurse pedagogy, cognitive psychology, psychological assessment, and decision science related to decision-making and nursing clinical judgment. Investigations and deep analysis followed.
“The contributions of countless nurses and nursing educators who participated in various research studies and more than 250,000 aspiring nurses volunteered to take sample questions on the NGN special research section in the NLCEX exam also helped to create the NGN,” noted the NCSBN.
“The result of this work was an evidence-based framework for developing, classifying, and scoring test items that was not only technologically attainable, but feasible within the current computerized adaptive testing paradigm of the NCLEX."
While the NCJMM does not define—or redefine—clinical judgment, it does allow, for the first time, a method for NCSBN to measure and draw suppositions regarding the nursing clinical judgment and decision-making ability of prospective entry-level nurses, who are required to make increasingly complex decisions while delivering patient care, the national council says.
“Because clinical judgment underlies almost all of a nurse’s activities, it is of paramount importance to NCSBN,” said Philip Dickison, PhD, RN, chief operating officer of NCSBN. “We need to be able to measure it effectively to safeguard public protection. We need to help ensure that when a regulatory body licenses a nurse to practice, they are safe to care for you and your loved ones.”
Carol Davis is the Nursing Editor at HealthLeaders, an HCPro brand.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Next Generation NCLEX (NGN) measures a nurse candidate’s ability to think more critically.
The framework of the enhanced NCLEX is the NCSBN Clinical Judgment Measurement Model (NCJMM).
The NGN took more than a decade of research, investigations, and analysis.