Challenges in nursing continuing education: A qualitative study.

BACKGROUND: Nursing continuing education with development of knowledge, skill, and attitude results in improvement of nursing activity, and thus improves the health care in the society. If the education is not planned and implement properly, it affects the patient care. This study was designed to explore the challenges of nursing continuing education in Isfahan University of Medical Sciences hospitals. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The research was conducted from April 2012 to February 2013 in Isfahan, Iran. The sampling was begun with purposeful method and continued with snowball method. Thirty-nine participants were selected among the nurses of Alzahra, Kashani, and Noor hospitals, nursing and midwifery faculty, continuing education center, and the vice-chancellery for treatment. The participants were both learners and planners of continuing education program. In this descriptive explorative qualitative research, we interviewed 39 participants in five focus group and five individual interviews, until data saturation was achieved. We used semi-structured interviews and field notes for data gathering, and members checking, triangulation (data and method), peer debriefing, and peer review to increase the strength of data. Data were analyzed with thematic analysis method that was proposed by Broun and Clarke in 2006. RESULTS: Data analysis produced 175 initial codes, 8 subthemes, and 5 main themes. The main themes included: Learners related factors, teachers related factors, educational process related factors, inadequate facilities, and defective evaluation. CONCLUSIONS: According to the results, we need to revise the educational process in nursing continuing education. To achieve this goal, we need a team for needs assessment, planning, and evaluation. In addition, we must pay attention to educators' and learners' issues.

Quality of work life and its association with workplace violence of the nurses in emergency departments.

BACKGROUND: Nurses as the major group of health service providers need to have a satisfactory quality of work life in order to give desirable care to the patients. Workplace violence is one of the most important factors that cause decline in the quality of work life. This study aimed to determine the quality of work life of nurses in selected hospitals of Isfahan University of Medical Sciences and its relationship with workplace violence. MATERIALS AND METHODS: This was a descriptive-correlational study. A sample of 186 registered nurses was enrolled in the study using quota sampling method. The research instrument used was a questionnaire consisting of three parts: Demographic information, quality of work life, and workplace violence. Collected data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics by SPSS version 16. RESULTS: The subjects consisted of 26.9% men and 73.1% women, whose mean age was 33.76 (7.13) years. 29.6% were single and 70.4% were married. About 76.9% of the subjects were exposed to verbal violence and 26.9% were exposed to physical violence during past year. Mean score of QNWL was 115.88 (30.98). About 45.7% of the subjects had a low level of quality of work life. There was an inverse correlation between the quality of work and the frequency of exposures to workplace violence. CONCLUSIONS: According to the results of this study, it is suggested that the managers and decision makers in health care should plan strategies to reduce violence in the workplace and also develop a program to improve the quality of work life of nurses exposed to workplace violence.

Reviewing the nursing students' views toward OSCE test.

BACKGROUND: One of the essential components of learning and educational program is evaluation or examination. There are various methods for evaluating clinical skills among which objective structured clinical examination (OSCE) has been recognized as the most reliable method for evaluation of the clinical skills. METHODS: This was a one-step single-group descriptive study which was conducted through a researcher-made questionnaire. RESULTS: Results indicated that the view of most of the students in OSCE test has been good in terms of equipment and facilities with relative frequency of 59.2 percent, conditions of holding the examination with relative frequency of 50.9% and total test with relative frequency of 55.1%; in terms of physical environment, students' view was moderate with relative frequency of 469%. CONCLUSIONS: The results of the study showed that appropriateness of physical environment and equipment and facilities to hold OSCE can directly be involved in enhancing the quality of this test.

Evaluation of quality of working life and its association with job performance of the nurses.

BACKGROUND: Nurses often complain about overwork and underpay. It seems that the association between "quality of working life" (QWL) and the degree of nurses' involvement in their carrier is the critical factor in achieving a higher level of quality of care. This study aimed to assess the quality of working life and its association with "job performance" of the nurses in educational hospitals affiliated to Isfahan University of Medical Sciences in 2007. METHODS: This was a descriptive-correlation study. Target population included all the nurses who were employed in hospitals affiliated to Isfahan University of Medical Sciences. Sample size was 120 of the mentioned nurses. Sampling method was stratified random and data collection tool was a questionnaire. Data analysis was done using mean, frequency distribution and spearman test. RESULTS: Finding of the study showed that the most common kind of quality of working life in the nurses (56.7%) was moderate one. The most frequent nurses' task performance (79.2%) was also related to the moderate performance. There was a direct and significant relationship between job performance and quality of working life in all the aspects. CONCLUSIONS: According to the research findings, it is important to consider the workplace and quality of working life of the nurses for improving productivity and performance of the nurses. Organization and nursing managers should use programs that can improve quality of working life of the nurses.

Assessing the nursing error rate and related factors from the view of nursing staff.

BACKGROUND: Error is an inevitable aspect of all the professions particularly health and treatment-related jobs and it should be acknowledged that committing it cannot absolutely be preventable. Among the causes that necessitate the evaluation of nursing errors, it should be noted that errors not only lead to damage and mortality for the patients, but also they are one of the obvious and costly problems in the hospitals. It is believed that nurses have the focal role in committing nursing errors.The main objective of this study was to identify nursing errors and the related factors. METHODS: This was a descriptive-correlative study which was conducted in 2010. 239 nurses and head nurses who were working in the selected hospitals in Isfahan were selected randomly and participated in this research. In order to collect the data, two questionnaires were used, each one consisting of three sections of the demographic data, questions about the type of error and the effective factors for making the errors. RESULTS: The highest rate of error was reported about the lack of compiling and reviewing the medical history of the patient (31.75%) and also disregarding the appropriate time for prescription of the medicine (31.75%). Besides, the nurses and head nurses believed in more than one factor for committing the errors and mentioned the managerial factors (84.2%) and patient-related factors (50.5%) as the most important and the least important causes for the commitment of errors respectively. Moreover, there was a direct relationship between gender, ward, and having an extra job with the score of the nursing errors. CONCLUSIONS: Attempts for reducing and controlling the nursing errors can rely on the usage of systemic approaches for assessing the effective factors, removing these factors as much as possible, and designing a system for increasing the level of reporting these errors for identifying the weak points and jeopardizing factors.

The effect of anger management by nursing staff on violence rate against them in the emergency unit.

BACKGROUND: Violence at work is considered as part of the occupational hazards which can affect medical staff and have undesirable effects on quality of patients care. Anger management training causes increases the ability of individuals to change behavior and also can increase the ability of the individual in controlling the excitation in the undesirable conditions. This study aimed to determine the effect of anger management training program by nursing staff on violence rate against them. METHODS: This was a two-group, two-phase, semi-experimental study. Sixty six qualified nurses employed in emergency unit of Al-Zahra Hospital were divided into test and control groups. In this study, the modified questionnaire of World Health Organization was used with adequate validity and reliability to measure the violence rate and anger control. Thereafter, the test group received anger management training for four 60-minute sessions. RESULTS: The results of the study showed that there was no significant difference between the two groups in terms of demographic characteristics except marital status. In addition, there was a significant difference between the two groups in frequency distribution of psychological violence against nurses after the intervention, but there was no significant difference between the two groups in frequency distribution of physical violence against nurses. CONCLUSIONS: The results of this study corroborated the findings of the previous studies. Therefore, increase in self-control and communication skills and problem solving skills at the time of dealing with the patients and their relatives is a step in reducing one of the factors of violence at workplace.