An Investigation of Nursing Competency of Baccalaureate Nurses in Belize

• Main Authors: Lizett Bell, LizettBell貝麗姿
• Other Authors: Ue-Lin, Chung
• Format: Others
• Language: en_US
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/85x37t

碩士 === 國立台北護理學院 === 護理研究所 === 97 === Abstract A competent healthcare workforce is an essential component of an effective health care system. Therefore competency among nurses is essential to provide safe and optimum health care for the population. The purpose of the study is to (1) identify the level of nursing competencies of new registered nurses by means of self assessment, (2) identify the perspective of the level of nursing competencies of new nurses by their clinical supervisors, (3) identify the difference in perceptions of nursing competencies between the nurse and their clinical supervisors and (4) identify the factors that relates to the level of nursing competencies among Belizean BSN nurses. The study is an exploratory study that used the quantitative approach for data collect and analysis. The Six-D Scale questionnaire was used to collect data from 34 nurses in their first year of practice and 34 of their clinical supervisors. The results of the study revealed that new nurses perceived themselves as more competent than the perception of the clinical supervisor. The nurses and the clinical supervisor perceived that nurses are most competent in the professional development domain, with mean 3.37 (SD=.471), mean 3.09 (SD= .415) and both rank among the second highest respectively. While their views differ in the domain where the nurses are least competent; nurses believed that they are least competent in the planning and evaluation domain mean 3.08 (SD = .567), and rank lowest, while supervisor results reveal that nurses are least competent in the critical care domain mean of 2.86 ( SD = .310) which ranked among the lowest scores. The results from this study can be used to shed some light for the hospital administrations, nursing educational institution and the ministry of health for the need of continuing education for nurses in Belize.