Knowledge and attitudes of nursing students regarding advanced practice nursing activities

Abstract

Advanced practice nursing (APN) is a rapidly developing nursing profession worldwide. Advanced level education, expert knowledge, clinical competencies and complex decision-making abilities represent advanced practice nurses nowadays [1]. As the needs of health care services are increasing constantly (demographic aging, number of chronic diseases, the shortage of medical staff), countries have to meet these demands by implementing APN. APN is correlating with better access to health care, more rational provision of medical services, lower medical costs and greater patient satisfaction [2]. However, a diverse health care system and restricted autonomy for advanced nurses delay progress of APN in different countries. Lithuania does not have enough experience and information concerning this topic. The aim was to determine the knowledge and attitudes of nursing students regarding advanced practice nursing activities. The methods of research are quantitative. A questionnaire survey was performed online. The study was carried out from December 2020 until February 2021 using a self-made anonymous questionnaire. The participants were last year nursing program students of Lithuanian University of Health Sciences. They were divided into two groups: constant (students after graduating school with no experience working as a nurse) and extramural (students who finished a college for nurses and already had some experience working as a nurse). Overall, 73 nursing students participated in this survey (response rate – 87 %). Both groups of nursing students were evaluated with a knowledge test concerning APN activities. The average knowledge of nursing students was 8.41 (± 0.702 SD) points (from 10 points). Only 42.50% of constant and 42.42% of extramural student knowledge was estimated as very good. We identified that only half of the students (50% of constant and 48.48% of extramural students) are interested in APN Mast...[...].