Nursing Students' Reflections After Meetings With Patients and Their Relatives Enacted by Professional Actors: Being Touched and Feeling Empathy.

When professional actors have been used in mental health simulations with nursing students, the experience has been regarded as a meaningful contribution to their education and described as a safe way of experiencing challenging situations that can occur in clinical settings. The aim was to study nursing students' reflections after meetings with nursing patients and their relatives, as enacted by professional actors, in psychiatric/elderly care. The design was a qualitative descriptive research approach. Gibbs's ( 1988 ) reflective cycle was the basis for the questions that were asked. Written reflections with 60 nursing students were analysed using qualitative thematic content analysis. The analysis produced the theme "being touched and feeling empathy," with four categories: "becoming aware of what knowledge and skills are needed," "wanting to do well and to have the right answer," "daring to get close and being present," and "knowledge comes alive." Simulation with real people who act as patients or relatives in vulnerable situations creates feelings of empathy. To talk with them, experience eye contact, and see how they react on touch makes nursing students feel they have experienced closeness and their knowledge has become alive.