Background: Nurses� clinical competence is vital to ensure safe and high quality care, and the continuous\nassessment of nurses� clinical competence is of major concern. A validated instrument for the self-assessment of\nnurses� clinical competence at different educational levels across specialties and countries is lacking. The aim of this\nstudy was to test the reliability and construct validity of the new Professional Nurse Self-Assessment Scale\n(ProffNurse SAS) questionnaire in long term and home care contexts in Norway. The questionnaire is based on the\nNordic Advanced Practice Nursing model, in which the nurse-patient relationship is central.\nMethods: The study has a cross-sectional survey design. A purposive sample of 357 registered nurses who worked\nin long term and home care contexts in two geographical regions encompassing eight municipalities and three\ncounties was included. The respondents completed the 74-item ProffNurse SAS questionnaire and demographic\nbackground data was collected. Data collection was conducted in two phases: first region autumn 2011 and\nsecond region spring 2012.\nExploratory factor analyses (EFA) were used to test the psychometric properties of the questionnaire and included\nthe following steps: assessment of the factorality of the data, factor extraction by Principal Component Analysis\n(PCA), oblimin (oblique) factor rotation, and interpretation. Cronbach�s alpha was used to estimate the internal\nconsistency.\nResults: The PCA revealed a six-component structure, reducing the number of items in the questionnaire from 74\nto 51. Based on the content of the highest-loading items, the six components were named: Direct Clinical Practice,\nProfessional Development, Ethical Decision-Making, Clinical Leadership, Cooperation and Consultation, and Critical\nThinking. The Cronbach�s alpha values ranged from 0.940 (highest; Direct Clinical Practice) to 0.737 (lowest; Critical\nThinking), leading to the estimation that the ProffNurse SAS is reliable.\nConclusions: The six components support the study�s theoretical framework. The ProffNurse SAS showed\nacceptable reliability and construct validity and may therefore be a promising instrument for the assessment of\npracticing nurses� clinical competence. However, we recommend further psychometric testing in other countries\nand contexts and the inclusion of larger samples of nurses at various levels of education, particularly master�s level\nAPNs.
Loading....