A Survey on Specialty Competencies of Emergency Nurse Practitioners from 15 Tertiary General Hospitals in Guangdong Province

Abstract

Objective To understand the current situation of emergency nurses’ specialty competence and propose improvement strategies accordingly, aiming to provide a reference for the comprehensive enhancement of nurse competency as well as the selection and training of high-level nursing management talents. Methods Using a self-made questionnaire based on literature review, 266 emergency specialist nurses in 15 tertiary general hospitals in Guangdong Province were surveyed through the questionnaire star. Results The survey showed that the participants appeared to have a high level of self-confidence and recognition for most indicators, as suggested by a high score (195.46±23.64), except for the aspect of scientific research ability. The scores of scientific research ability items ranged from 3 to 15 points (the 50th quantile was 9 points), and the score was 10.41±2.28 with a median score of 10, indicating that clinical nurses lacked confidence in scientific research abilities. The results of linear regression analysis suggested that gender, job title, publications in recent 5 years, and whether directly affiliated to a teaching hospital were the influencing factors that affect the competence of emergency nurses. Conclusions Scientific research ability is the major shortcoming of emergency specialist nurses. The influencing factors that affect nurses’ competencies include gender, professional title, publications in recent 5 years and whether directly affiliated to a teaching hospital. Nursing scientific research is the power source of the continuous development of nursing discipline. Therefore, it is recommended that the leaders of healthcare authorities and hospitals should strengthen the training of nursing scientific research and improve the scientific research ability of nurses.