Background: An internship programme is an important period that enables nursing students to work and function as primary nurses, with three to eight patients per shift, in order to develop their clinical skills by integrating theory with practice and improving their assessment, problem solving, and interpersonal skills. Having undergraduate nursing interns from different colleges in one clinical placement may explain the variation regarding the factors, challenges, and barriers that affect students' clinical practice during the internship period. Study aim: This study aimed to explore the clinical practice experiences of nursing students doing internship years at different hospitals in Saudi Arabia. Method: A descriptive qualitative study was conducted with nursing interns from the Faculty of Nursing at a university in Saudi Arabia, who were doing internship years at different hospitals. The study participants were selected using purposive sampling. The data were collected via three semistructured focus group interviews and analyzed using thematic analysis. Results: Educational programmes, hospital orientation programmes, and mentorship programmes were all highlighted as the most important influencing factors in the interns' clinical practice. In addition, unfair treatment, the ignorance of healthcare professionals, and being involved in non-nursing work were highlighted as challenging factors that negatively affected the interns' clinical practice. Conclusion: There is a need for continuous educational programmes and mentorship programmes to be provided for all nursing interns, in particular by hospital education departments. In addition, a clear job description and list of responsibilities for all nursing interns should be provided at the start of the internship programme in order to prevent interns from being involved in non-nursing work.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
customersupport@researchsolutions.com
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.