5 Strategies to Boost Your Next Gen NCLEX Pass Rates with VR Training

Imagine your students are in their last year of nursing school, prepping to take the Next Generation NCLEX, and they feel confident and ready to tackle the test. Your classrooms, simulation labs, and clinicals have effectively prepared them. Specifically, virtual reality (VR) played a big role. 

By incorporating VR training into the curriculum, educators can provide learners with immersive learning experiences that closely mirror real-world clinical practice. This innovative approach not only enhances students' understanding of patient care but also fosters the development of the required skills essential for success in the nursing profession.

Here are some ways to use VR training to improve students’ NCLEX pass rates. 

5 Strategies for Using VR to Improve NCLEX Pass Rates

1. Reinforce knowledge through repetition and immersive learning

In VR, students can try scenarios repeatedly without any risk of failing the NCLEX or harming patients. Researchers studied how repetition in immersive simulation can be beneficial and found: “Participants reported that the repeated nature reinforced their knowledge base, increased their self-efficacy, reduced their anxiety levels, and helped them to prepare for placement.” 

The immersive nature of UbiSim elicits a “wow” from users. They step inside a hospital room and immediately into the shoes of a real nurse. Bailey, a National University student, shared: “The part of UbiSim that I like best is how realistic it is. You can hear the lung and heart sounds. I've even tried to hop into a different scenario before and see the difference between listening to somebody who didn't have COPD and someone who did. It’s been helpful.”

This realism helps students become familiar with the nuances of patient care, such as recognizing subtle changes in a patient’s condition or responding to critical incidents under pressure. For example, hearing accurate lung and heart sounds or observing how different conditions present in a virtual patient enhances students' ability to identify and prioritize nursing interventions—skills that are essential for success on the NCLEX.

2. Enhance clinical judgment and decision-making

Clinical judgment and decision-making are core pillars for the Next Gen NCLEX. Research on VR has demonstrated its potential to improve undergraduate nurses' critical thinking, clinical reasoning, clinical judgment, and clinical decision-making skills. 

All UbiSim scenarios build upon the NCSBN Clinical Judgment Measurement Model (NCJMM) as a framework for the valid measurement of clinical judgment and decision-making within the context of a standardized, high-stakes examination. The NCJMM has contextual layers from 0 to 4. During the scenario design process, UbiSim nurse educators align the needs assessment with Layer 3 of the NCJMM to ensure learners can perform all steps of the clinical judgment process, from recognizing cues to evaluating outcomes. 

Nurse educators can easily use the diverse library of pre-made valid and reliable scenarios or the web-based Editor to customize or create VR scenarios focused on clinical judgment. UbiSim also provides a realistic context for learners to develop clinical judgment skills. Time constraints, risks, and consequences affect the decision-making process; these realistic elements are present throughout the scenarios.

3. Bridge the gap between theory and practice

Nursing students learn how to care for different patient cases, such as someone with Alzheimer's Disease, in theory, but sometimes they never get hands-on practice. This gap between theory and practice can leave students feeling unprepared for the NCLEX, where they must demonstrate their ability to apply theoretical knowledge in real-world scenarios.

VR training with UbiSim effectively bridges this gap by providing students with realistic, hands-on experiences that mirror the complexities of actual patient care. Through immersive simulations, students can practice caring for patients with diverse conditions, gaining the confidence and skills they need to handle similar cases on the NCLEX.

UbiSim's unfolding case studies are particularly powerful in this regard. Just like the NCLEX, these case studies are designed to present students with evolving scenarios where patient conditions can change unpredictably. This helps learners develop critical thinking and adaptability—key skills for nursing practice—by forcing them to anticipate and respond to new challenges as they arise.

4. Monitor progress and provide targeted feedback

Consistent and ongoing assessment is crucial in the lead-up to the NCLEX for tracking a student's progress and identifying areas for improvement. This continuous evaluation ensures that students consistently move toward competency in all required areas.

UbiSim provides a detailed report at the end of a VR scenario that gives feedback on each step that a learner may have missed, such as forgetting to scrub the hub or wash their hands. 

This level of detailed feedback is invaluable in preparing for the NCLEX, where attention to detail and adherence to best practices are rigorously tested. By practicing in a realistic, high-fidelity environment, students can refine their skills, receive targeted feedback, and continuously improve their performance, making them more confident and better prepared for the actual exam as well as clinical practice.

5. Foster collaboration and communication skills

The NCLEX includes questions that specifically test a student's ability to communicate and collaborate effectively with other nurses and healthcare providers. These questions are designed to assess how well future nurses can function within a team, ensuring patient safety and delivering coordinated care. Effective communication is critical, especially in high-stress environments where clear, concise information can prevent errors and improve outcomes.

UbiSim takes this aspect of nursing education to the next level by offering a multiplayer mode in its VR simulations. This feature allows learners to work together in real time, simulating the dynamics of a healthcare team. Students can collaborate with their peers, acting as nurses working together on a shared patient case, or they can communicate with virtual providers such as doctors and specialists.

The authors of a 2024 study set out to examine the effectiveness of a virtual reality communication simulation in teaching communication skills in fundamentals of nursing practicum. The researchers found that nursing students who trained in virtual reality had significantly higher communication abilities and lower levels of stress. They concluded that VR is “acceptable and worthwhile for training nursing students to develop communication abilities.”

Final Thoughts

As the demands of the Next Generation NCLEX continue to evolve, so too must our approaches to nursing education. VR is a great tool to use in your curriculum alongside other modalities to best prepare your students to tackle the test.