An Investigation Of Professional Identity And Related Factors In Nursing Students And Nurses

BackgroundIn the twenty-first century, with the population aging, the lack of resources, the change of disease patterns, and the rising expectations of the patients for medical services, the connotation of nursing has been greatly expanded. The nurse is playing an important role to protect and promote human health, and the demand for the nurse will be increased. However, there are not enough nurses in comparison with the population in our country, and the main reason is the loss of senior nurses increased year by year. Studies show that to nurse, the level of work stress and the wishes to resign are negatively correlated to her professional identity. The formation of nurse’s professional awareness begins at the initial stage of her school time, and during this period in which is the key time of the development of professional identity, nurse student is plastic strongly. The professional identity of nurse student will directly affect the stability of the nurse team.ObjectiveThe study based on the investigation of the probationer nurses and the nurses whose lengths of service were different to understand their current situation of professional identity and the influencing factors. Based on the study, the focus of vocational education is tried to be found out, and some suggestions are provided to promote nurse’s professional identity in hierarchical intervention research in education and management.MethodsOn the principle of convenience sampling, the probationer nurses who had been practicing in the hospitals more than six months from two medicine institutions and one medicine school were investigated.1120questionnaires were distributed,1120were recovered, and1038questionnaires were valid, including709probationer nurses from the institutes and329probationer nurses from the school. On the principle of convenience sampling, the nurses who were in the departments in where the probationer nurses were practicing from ten third-class hospitals, four second-class hospitals and six community health service centers were investigated.1000questionnaires were distributed,989were recovered, and921questionnaires were valid, including644nurses from the third-class hospitals,145nurses from the second-class hospitals and132nurses from the community health service centers. The departments are including emergency room, operating room, internal medicine, surgery, obstetrics and gynecology, pediatrics, intensive care room, and so on.The main quotas are general situations, professional identity, social support, professional self-concept of nurses, work stressor, and stress level. SPSS software for windows version16.0was applied to analyze the data.ResultsOf the1038cases of the probationer nurses, who participated in the survey, the only child was73.70%, the probationer nurses from cities, towns and rural areas were distinguishable56.45%,24.66%and18.89%, the probationer nurses who felt the teachers had positive attitude of nurse profession was63.01%and the probationer nurses who felt the nurses had positive attitude of nurse profession was56.65%, the probationer nurses who choose the nurse speciality of their own accord was41.81%, the probationer nurses who have families working in hospitals was25.43%.Of the921cases of the nurses, who participated in the survey, the mean of the nurses’age was28.26+6.13of college education and higher was61.02%, the nurse whose length of service was less than one year, one to three years, three to five years, five to ten years and more than ten years were distinguishable10.86%,22.15%.19.98%,23.24%and23.78%, the nurses working in the intensive care rooms was10.86%, the nurses whose salary were more than4000RMB was34.74%, the nurses who choose the nurse speciality of their own accord was38.87%, the nurses who have families working in hospitals was27.36%.The mean score of the probationer nurses’ professional identity was32.23±7.415and the nurses was30.43±9.355. Both the probationer nurses and the nurses, the individual with the highest score was "1agree with my work very much", the individual with the lowest score was "I hope my child will go in for this work in the future" Contacting with nurse profession for the longer time, the nurses’ professional identity is on a declining trend, while the nurses’ work stressor are rising, and psychosomatic health level are falling.When the student nurses and the nurses were under the same work stress, the higher professional identity they had, the higher psychosomatic health level they would have and vice versa.Influence factors associated with professional identity of student nurses in order were as follow:professional self-concept of nurses, the nurses’ attitudes to nurse profession, reasons for choosing nurse speciality, social support, and education degree.Influence factors associated with professional identity of nurses in order were as follow:professional self-concept of nurses, work stressor, salary, social support, length of service, reasons for choosing nurse speciality, the class of hospital, department.ConclusionsThe level of professional identity of student nurses and nurses are normal. To promote the level of professional identity is good for releasing work stress to nurse. To nurse, the level of professional identity is influenced by their own factors, educational factors and social factors.SuggestionsTo promote the level of nurse’s professional identity, and alleviate work stress, then reduce turnover rate, including enhancing self education, relevant departments should be multi-pronged setting about paying attention to the focus group, improving the efficiency of nurse student’s practice, and promoting the development of nurse student’s and nurse’s professional self-concept.