BACKGROUND: Facilitating the healing process of patients with psychiatric disorders depends on high-quality mental health care and expert psychiatric nurses. A valid tool is required to objectively evaluate the quality of performance and competency of psychiatric nurses. This systematic review aimed to investigate and critique the psychometric properties of some psychiatric nursing clinical competency assessment instruments with Consensus-based standards for the selection of health status measurement instruments (COSMIN) checklist and according to Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-analyses (PRISMA). MATERIALS AND METHODS: To retrieve published articles using Persian and English keywords “psychiatric nursing,” “competence,” “competency,” “tool,” “checklist,” “scale,” “questionnaire,” “psychiatric mental health nurse,” were searched in databases without time limitation. Then, psychometric properties of selected instruments were evaluated using the COSMIN checklist and reported according to the PRISMA statement. RESULTS: Most of these tools did not entirely and desirably report psychometric properties. It is not designed as a special tool for postgraduate psychiatric nursing. CONCLUSION: The methodology of existing instruments does not meet the COSMIN checklist criteria; therefore it needs to develop. To assess the competency of psychiatric nursing postgraduate, a tool tailored to the cultural and social context and with acceptable psychometric properties is necessary.

BACKGROUND: Technical skills result in the patient's safety. Psychiatric nurses need to learn and apply them to provide effective and secure cares. This study explains the technical competency required for postgraduate psychiatric nursing students. MATERIALS AND METHODS: This conventional qualitative content analysis study is part of a larger study on the clinical competency of postgraduate psychiatric nursing students performed in Iran in 2020. A qualitative study was conducted at universities holding master's degree courses in psychiatric nursing. Participants were instructors and postgraduate psychiatric nursing students, psychiatric nurses, psychologists, and psychiatrists selected by purposeful sampling method. Sampling continued until data saturation was achieved. Data were collected through a semi-structured individual interview and were analyzed by conventional qualitative content analysis. RESULTS: The “technical competency” has two subcategories of “specialized knowledge” (including general nursing knowledge, psychiatric nursing knowledge, and basic knowledge of psychology) and “application of knowledge in practice” (including clinical experience, skills of psychiatric nursing interventions, educational skills, and research and evidence-based practice skills). CONCLUSION: The psychiatric nursing student learns and operates knowledge of psychiatric nursing, psychology, education, and research, besides improving their knowledge of general nursing.

Background: Due to getting optimal psychiatric nursing care, competent psychiatric nurses is required. One approach for MSc psychiatric nursing students` optimal clinical competency is clinical education. Identifying the factors affecting on achieving maximum scientific and technical abilities, education would be more effective. This study aims to explore the meta competency required in MSc students in psychiatric nursing.Methods: This is a qualitative study with content analysis approach conducted on 21 participants in Iran. Sampling were done based on purposive sampling. Data were collected using individual semi structured and in-depth interviews. Collected data were analyzed using the conventional content analysis. The rigor of qualitative data were assessed using the 4 criteria proposed by Guba and Lincoln. Results: Four dimensions were revealed: (1)Thinking and clinical reasoning skills, (2)Dynamic learning, (3)Research and evidence based practice, (4)Human and organizational management. Each category had several distinct sub-categories.Conclusions: The results of this study showed that meta-competency for psychiatric nursing MSc students is multidimensional concept. The findings of the study can be used for educating MSc students in psychiatric nursing and evaluating meta competency. More studies on meta competency required psychiatric nursing students and designing an objective tool for assessing them meta competency in Iran are proposed.