Rate My Professor Peter 'Kevin' O'Shaughnessy

Dr Peter ‘Kevin’ O’Shaughnessy serves as the Program Director: Simulation Teaching and Learning in the School of Nursing and Midwifery, College of Health, at Adelaide University. In this capacity, he provides academic and clinical leadership for the planning, management, development, quality assurance, and delivery of authentic clinical teaching and learning experiences through simulation and innovative work-integrated learning. He coordinates a team of clinical academics, teaching staff, and technicians across three campus sites to develop, maintain, and enhance simulation-based teaching, learning, and assessment. With over 18 years of experience in course coordination and teaching in clinical health sciences and nursing at the University of South Australia and Adelaide University, Dr O’Shaughnessy draws from his extensive background as a clinical nurse specializing in emergency department care, bringing deep knowledge in nursing, operations, public health, and administration. He completed his PhD in the Division of Health Sciences at the University of South Australia in 2016, and earlier received the Chancellor’s Merit List and Dean’s Merit List honors in 2004, along with being shortlisted for the St. Andrews Scholarship.

Dr O’Shaughnessy’s research interests encompass nursing older people, palliative care, supportive care, acute care nursing, and emergency nursing. He leads the ACHIEVE project, a community initiative to enhance simulation resources preparing undergraduate health science students for challenging conversations on dementia, cancer, grief, fertility, loss, and end-of-life care. Additional projects include the completed TREK research program (2024), investigations into supportive care needs of prostate cancer survivors and their partners from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds, loneliness and isolation among cancer survivors and families, and family dynamics with children living with asthma. Key publications include Forrest et al. (2025) on pharmacy and nursing interprofessional learning in simulation; Smart et al. (2025) on child health nurses’ practices for developmental dysplasia screening; O’Shaughnessy, Laws, and Esterman (2015) on the prostate cancer journey from an online survey; O’Shaughnessy et al. (2013) on impaired sexual function in prostate cancer patients and partners; and O’Shaughnessy and Laws (2009) on Australian men’s long-term experiences post-prostatectomy. Awards include the UniSA Unstoppable Enterprising Staff Award: People First category (2025), multiple UniSA teaching and learning grants (2024-2025), UniSA Slingshot and Accelerator publishing grants (2024), and the School of Nursing and Midwifery Pathfinder travel grant (2018). He holds memberships in Simulation Australasia, Clinical Oncology Society of Australia, College of Emergency Nurses Australia, Palliative Care SA, and the South Australian Psycho-Oncology Co-operative Research Group.