IMPACT OF A TRAINING PROGRAMME ON UTILIZATION OF NURSING PROCESS AMONG COMMUNITY HEALTH NURSES IN PRIMARY HEALTH CARE CENTRES IN IJEBU-ODE LGA
ABSTRACT
The nursing process is a scientific and systematic method of solving the numerous patient’s problems, which promotes problem solving in professional practice, and is useful because it promotes congruency and uniformity in practice.
This study was carried out evaluate the impact of a training programme on utilisation of nursing process among community health nurses in primary health care centres in Ijebu-Ode LGA. A thorough review of literature was done on the subject under study. The study design was a quasi-experimental study and a total of 32 female participants took part in this study. They were purposively assigned into the two treatment groups – intervention group (participants who were trained on the use of nursing process) and the placebo control group (participants who were not trained) using the relevant inclusion and exclusion criteria. The intervention group had 18 (56.3%) participants while the control group had 14 (43.7%) participants. Data was collected using close-ended structured questionnaires and performance observation check-lists. A statistical package for social sciences (SPSS 24.0) was used to analyse data, descriptive statistics was used to present data, and inferential statistics such as chi-square test was used to test the relationship between different variables of the study at 0.05 significant levels.
The results of analysed data showed that participants had fair knowledge towards the utilization of nursing process, participants also showed negative attitude towards the utilization of nursing process for health care delivery. Further findings revealed low level of practice of nursing process among community health nurses in primary health care centres in the study area. The results of t-test statistic showed that the post-implementation impact of the training programme was significant on the knowledge of community health nurses (t= -1.565; p < .05), attitude of community health nurses (t= -3.699; p < .05), and on the performance of community health nurses (t= – 16.194; p <.05) in primary health care centres. The univariate test of effect showed that there was a significant effect of the training programme on participants’ post-test performance (F = 267.628; p < 0.05) with Least Square Difference (LSD) comparisons indicate that the post implementation performance of participants who were not trained and those who were exposed to training programme were statistically different (MD = -19.158; Std error = 1.171; p < 0.05). Years of experience of the participants were not significantly associated with the assimilation of the training programme, χ2(12) = 12.125.
The study concluded that the intervention group exerted a greater effect over the control group, with overall improvement in their knowledge, attitude and practice of the nursing process. It is recommended that community health nurses should attend periodic workshops to enhance their ability to use nursing process to improve the quality of patient’s care. Nurse educators should also constantly reflect on the nursing curricula to strengthen the role of registered nurses on the utilisation of the nursing process when implementing elements of PHC in their daily practice.
Keywords: Impact, training programme, utilisation, Nursing process, Primary Health Care