Perceived Relationship among Professional Self-Concept, Head Nurse's Leadership, and Nursing Clinical Competency by Clinical Nurses / 간호행정학회지

ABSTRACT

PURPOSE: This study was performed to investigate the perceived relationship among professional self-concept, head nurse's leadership, and nursing clinical competency by clinical nurses. METHODS: This study was a cross-sectional survey. Participants were 601 nurses working at the five general hospitals in four provincial cities, Gyeungbuk, Korea. Data were collected from July 14, 2010 to August 31 and analyzed by SPSS/PC ver 18.0 programs. RESULTS: Professional self-concept and head nurse's leadership were slightly above the middle average, but nursing clinical competency was good. According to participants' age, marital status, job satisfaction, and length of service, there were perceptional differences in professional self-concept, head nurse's leadership, and nursing clinical competency. Nursing clinical competency could be explained by head nurse's leadership, professional self-concept, job satisfaction and length of service. Head nurse's leadership was independent variable affecting nursing clinical competency, professional self-concept was partial mediating variable, and job satisfaction and length of service were extraneous variables. CONCLUSION: It is concluded that head nurse's leadership is more important than professional self-concept to improve nursing clinical competency. Nursing managers should plan various strategies to improve head nurse's leadership and professional self-concept, to increase clinical nurses' job satisfaction and length of service.