Student nurses' perceptions of their clinical allocations in acute care settings : a phenomenological study

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to gain a better understanding of the clinical experience from a nursing students' point of view. This was done in light of the view that major reforms have taken place within nurse education in Malta in the past years. In light of these reforms, the study aimed to highlight the importance of clinical education in becoming a nurse. This aim of this study was to explore the feelings and experiences of nursing students regarding their clinical practice areas using a phenomenological approach through a Husserlian perspective. Data was collected from a purposive sample of fifteen final year Bachelor of Nursing Students, attending the Institute of Health Care at the University of Malta using a tape-recorded semi-structured interview. Data analysis was done following Colazzi's framework and three major themes were extracted. These were student nurses' relationships with staff, the ward environment and their experience of mentorship. These were further sub-divided into sub-themes. Participants spoke of both negative and positive experiences while on medical and surgical wards and expressed their struggle with being accepted on the wards and their relationships with staff, coping with the organization they work in and practicing what they learnt. They described all this in relation to learning and becoming competent practitioners. It was found that students do not look favourably at medical wards and would not choose them as places to work on in the future. An aspect which was also highlighted was the lack of mentorship received and also the importance of mentorship as support to the nursing student while in the clinical area. These findings were discussed in relation to other literature. It was found that most of the experiences were not unique to Maltese nursing students. Limitations of the study are discussed and tentative recommendations based on the findings were done in order to help improve or make the clinical experience, as effective as possible for the student. It is important to note that the intention of this study was to find out what these perceptions were and not to develop a hypothesis or to generalise or predict future trends.