The Study On Core Competency Of Registered Nurses In Five Tertary Level First-class Hospitals In Liaoning Province

ObjectiveLearn the status quo of core competency of registered nurses in five hospitals of tertiary level first-class in Liaoning Province.Understand and compare the level and characteristics of core competency of registered nurses in terms of different working time,job title,educational background,current working department.MethodsThis was a descriptive study.By applying cluster and convenience sampling methods,1960 subjects were selected among 5 tertary level first-class hospitals in Liaoning Province."The Competency Inventery for Regestered Nurse scale"(CIRN,by Liu Ming)was distributed to investigate areas of critical thinking/research aptitude, clinical care,leadership,interpersonal relation,legal/ethical practice,professional development,teaching/coaching.The questionnaires were collected with 100%in return,of which 1900 were valid ones.Statistical software SPSS11.5 was used to analyse the data,P values less than 0.05 is considered significant.ResultsThe core competency level of registered nurses was reported.The overall score is 174.11±31.89,critical thinking and research aptitude score is 28.47±6.23,clinical care score is 26.75±5.41,leadership score is 30.39±5.85,interpersonal relationship score is 24.83±4.55,legal/ethical practice score is 25.80±4.59,professional development score is 17.45±3.72,teaching/coaching score is 20.31±4.55.The core competency of registered nurses with different lengths of woking experiences:The core competency level of registered nurses with 1～10 years of working experience was gradually increase.The core competency level of registered nurses with 16～20 years of working experience is highest(184.85±29.16),while the core competency level of registered nurses working for 1～5 year is lowest (160.95±31.30),P＜0.05.Comparing core competency levels of regeistered nurses' for working 11～15 years,16～20 years,more than 20 years,there were no significant difference among three groups,P＞0.05.The core competency level of registered nurses with different job title:the competence score was increasing gradually with the job title from the low to the high. The core competency score of Nurse-in-charge or above is 184.57±30.17,which is the highest group,P＜0.05.Secondly,the core competency score of senior nurse is 173.98±30.74,P＜0.05.The lowest score is 162.43±30.85,which belongs to the junior nurse's group.The core competency of nurses increases with the upgrading educational preparation.Only the scores in the clinical care showes no statistical significance,P＞0.05.The competency score of the nurses graduated from technical secondary school,is the lowest(168.74±37.76).For nurses with diploma degree,the score is 17.43±3.56 in professional development,20.28±4.41 in teaching/coaching.These scores are better than those for nurses from technical secondary school,P＜0.05.For nurses with bachelor degree or above,the overall competency score is the highest(177.14±30.62); the score in leadership is 30.99±5.69,in interpersonal relationship is 25.32±4.35,in legal/ethical practice is 26.27±4.37,which are higher than those for nurses with diploma degree as well as those for nurses from technical secondary school,P＜0.05.Comparing the competency scores for nurses in different departments of hospital, the total score is 176.40±31.62 for nurses in surgery ward.In internal medicine ward,the total score is 172.85±32.10,in obstetric and gynecology ward,the score is 171.68±30.91,.in pediatric ward,is 164.92±31.64,in emergency department is 174.73±30.43,in ICU is 178.27±27.37.However,there is no statistical significance (P＞0.05) in leadership,interpersonal relationship,legal/ethical practice, teaching/coaching aspects for nurses in different departments.Pediatric nurses get the lowest core competency score in critical thinking/research aptitude(25.72±6.18),clinical care(24.53±5.34) and professional development (16.11±4.01) areas,P＜0.05.ICU nurses get the highest core competency score, especially in the critical thinking/research aptitude area(30.60±5.44),P＜0.05. ConclusionsThe overall core competency is at the upper middle level for registered nurses from five tertiary level first-class hospitals in Liaoning Province.They are competent enough to provide health care.With the growth of working age,job title and advanced nursing education preparation,nurses' core competency level was strengthened gradually.However,for nurses with more than 10 year's working experiences the core competency development becomes slow.There are no significant differences in clinical care for nurses with different levels of educational preparation.There are some differences in core competency levels for nurses in different departments.The ICU nurses get the better scores in critical thinking and research ability than the others.Pediatric nurses get the lowest core competency scores in critical thinking and research appititude, clinical care and professional development.