Reality or a Dream: Barriers and Facilitators for Nursing Assistants Pursuing a Nursing Career

Certified nursing assistants (CNAs) serve a critical role in the care of older adults. However, CNAs often experience significant professional and personal burdens related to caregiving work. Professionally, CNAs experience exorbitant workplace stress (e.g., physical injury, burnout, emotional exhaustion, staffing shortages, turnover). Personally, CNAs may have only a high school education, are subjected to low-paying jobs, and little opportunity for career advancement. Further, CNAs are disproportionately of minority race. Clearly, CNAs are negatively impacted by many social determinants of health. Ultimately, these burdens negatively impact older adults’ care provision and quality of life. Transitioning to a nursing career may alleviate some of these complex problems, but this has scantly been explored. A qualitative descriptive study was designed to 1) identify interest in a nursing career, and 2) explore perceived barriers and facilitators of transitioning into a nursing profession. CNAs from nursing facilities participated in private, semi-structured interviews. Recorded interviews (n = 6) were transcribed verbatim. Preliminary thematic analyses yielded two overarching themes: The Dream and The Reality. Rich subthemes began emerging from both overarching themes. Example subthemes from The Dream were: family legacy in healthcare, and finding purpose. Example subthemes from The Reality were: versus (CNAs vs. nurses; nurses vs. nursing care), and work-life balance. These preliminary findings suggest that CNAs express desire in becoming a nurse, although a range of personal and professional barriers and facilitators exist. Making the nursing dream become reality may improve CNAs’ social determinants, workplace outcomes, and resident outcomes, but further exploration is warranted.

Supporting the Professional Identity Development of Nursing Alumni: A Phenomenology Study

BACKGROUND: Professional identity is the expected outcome of nursing educational institutions reflected in the values, beliefs, attitudes, and behavior of nursing alumni as professional nurses. Nursing alumni’s experiences at the Bachelor nursing program in Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta (UMY) related to professional identity development (PID) at various nursing careers need to be explored. AIM: This study aims to describe Ners alumni in PID at Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta (UMY). METHODS: This study was a phenomenological approach with a maximum variation sampling technique. Seventeen nursing alumni who have been working as professional nurses for a minimum of two years and worked in various nursing careers were recruited. A semi-structured interview between 60-90 minutes was conducted. Data analysis used Colaizzi’s methods and Nvivo 12TM Plus. RESULTS: There were two themes emerged from data; 1) Internal motivation to enhancing nursing career, with two sub-themes: having a great personal motivation and developing expertise, 2) External support driving nursing career, with five sub-themes: family encouragement, supports from a leader, accreditation and credential, exemplary role model and positive nursing image. CONCLUSION: Nursing alumni engaged in a variety of professional roles that contributed to the nursing workforce. The supporting of PID impacts personal and professional capability and strengthens nurses’ careers.

Team working part 5: Everyone is valuable

John Fowler, Educational Consultant, explores how to survive your nursing career

Coming full circle: a nursing career shaped by living with congenital heart disease

In this month's issue of Spotlight on Nurses, Sarah Ellison reflects on her journey as both a cardiac nurse and a cardiac patient, as well as the inspiration and support received over the years, and how all of these have helped to shape her life and her career.

Service-learning: experience of teacher-tutors in the nursing career

Introduction The learning process demands appropriate and effective strategies. Furthermore, the service-learning methodology implies significant challenges for both the student and the teacher-tutor. Objective To reveal the experience of community-based teacher-tutors work with nursing students from the Austral University of Chile, using the service-learning methodology. Method Descriptive and exploratory qualitative research through an intrinsic case study. Non-probabilistic and intentional sample of cases by criteria and convenience. Five teachers from the Austral University of Chile Nursing Institute hired by the university were interviewed. They fulfilled the role of teacher-tutor after signing the informed consent. The information was obtained through semi-structured interviews, and the analysis was carried out through the data reduction methodology, which considers the analysis of results at three levels. The Scientific Ethics Committee of the Austral University of Chile School of Medicine approved the study. Results At level 1: One hundred and seven (107) units of meaning were identified, grouped into five descriptive categories. At level 2, three meta-categories were formed: "opinion of the tutor-teachers on working with the service-learning methodology", "factors that influence working with the service-learning methodology" and "generic competencies developed with the service-learning methodology. Finally, at level 3, two qualitative domains were identified: "Teacher-tutors appreciation for the development of the service-learning methodology" and "Contributions of the service-learning methodology for developing generic competencies". Conclusions The efficient implementation of the methodology requires training and motivation of tutors, teachers, students and community partners.