FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — The Eleanor Mann School of Nursing at the University of Arkansas recently earned accreditation from the Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education for its new master of science degree in nursing. With the first class of students graduating last month, the program is already improving patient care in Northwest Arkansas.

The accreditation term runs for five years, ending in June 2012, the maximum length allowable for a new program. The school’s baccalaureate degree program earned reaccreditation for a 10-year period, the maximum length possible for an existing program.

“We are very pleased to have this level of recognition by the Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education,” said Reed Greenwood, dean of the College of Education and Health Professions. “By undertaking this voluntary, self-regulatory process, the nursing school assures the health care community and the public that its graduates have received a high-quality educational program that prepares them to do work that will improve the health of people in Arkansas and around the country.”

The Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education, which is recognized by the U.S. Secretary of Education as a national accreditation agency, ensures the quality and integrity of baccalaureate and graduate education programs preparing effective nurses.

“This accreditation announces to the community, the state and the nation that we have met the standards set by the national organization for quality of our teaching, research and service,” said Tom Kippenbrock, director of the Mann School. “Seeking accreditation is a rigorous process that included a three-day site visit by a four-person team that interviewed students, faculty members, alums and local health care providers about our program. The team visited classrooms, laboratories and clinical practicum sites to see the students in their learning environments. With accreditation, our students and graduates can show their employers the quality of the program from which they graduated.”

The Mann School’s master’s program started in fall 2005 and graduated six nurses this May with two more finishing requirements this summer. All but one of the master’s students had been working in the profession for several years.

The master’s program educates nurses as clinical nurse specialists, who study research findings and evidence-based treatment methods in order to improve patient care. Many supervise other nurses.

Susan Kimbrell of Bentonville, who has worked as a home health nurse for 11 years following 10 years working as a hospital nurse, is the single mother of a 13-year-old daughter. She wanted to obtain a master’s degree before her daughter was ready to go to college.

Kimbrell described the clinical nurse specialist as a resource for other nurses. The clinical nurse specialist can act as a leader and agent of change in hospital settings, Kimbrell said, and may have three spheres of influence: with patients, other nurses and the health care system itself.

Kippenbrock said the school selected the specialty based on a survey of the health care community and nurses. Within the broad area of advanced practice nursing, nurse practitioners generally work in doctors’ offices and clinics, Kippenbrock said, while clinical nurse specialists more commonly work with hospitalized patients.

“We found through the surveys that there were nurses interested in working in hospital settings who wanted more advanced practice education,” he said.

As part of their course requirements, the master’s students educated employers about the role of clinical nurse specialists, writing job descriptions and, in at least one case, implementing new procedures. Two of the master’s students who work for Washington Regional Medical Center demonstrated the vital contribution a clinical nurse specialist can make by designing a rapid-response-team approach the hospital adopted with the result that the number of patients suffering cardiac arrest dropped dramatically.

“We teamed up and went to the hospital administration,” Gina Wilson explained. “We told them we wanted to be clinical nurse specialists and asked what we could do to show them the value of this role. They gave us a pilot project. It was very successful. The inpatient code blue rate dropped 66 percent in the first quarter of this year compared to last year.”

Wilson, of Huntsville, has worked as an emergency room nurse for nine years at Washington Regional. She jumped at the opportunity to get a master’s degree when she saw signs about it posted in the hospital. She and Sheryl Davis of Hindsville, also employed at Washington Regional, traveled last year to Indiana where they spent a week learning about the rapid-response-team approach at a hospital there. Later, they demonstrated their plan at a clinical nurse specialist conference in Phoenix, where they were two of 10 student presenters from around the nation.

The two nurses dubbed the system T-REX for “team response extreme” and put dinosaur stickers around the hospital to increase awareness of the system. It uses the hospital’s computerized charting system to monitor a patient’s vital signs for early indications that the patient could be heading for cardiac arrest. These warning signals can become apparent as much as eight hours before cardiac arrest, research showed, and early intervention by the team could head off the cardiac arrest.

About 20 students are expected to begin the master’s program in the fall. Lecture classes will be delivered online while labs will continue at Ozark Hall on the Fayetteville campus and clinical rotations in health care facilities.

The program qualifies graduates to take a national exam for certification as clinical nurse specialists.