DEVELOPING AND WRITING NURSING CARE PLANS: THE LIVED EXPERIENCE OF BACCALAUREATE NURSING STUDENTS.
Contributors: Widener University School Of Nursing.
Published: 1992
Number of pages: 228
Subjects: Health Sciences, Nursing.; Health Sciences, Education.
Description: Merleau-Ponty's existential phenomenology of perception provided the framework for this exploratory study of the lived experience of baccalaureate nursing students with the phenomenon of developing and writing nursing care plans. Twenty-three senior level baccalaureate nursing students participated in tape-recorded interviews exploring their perceptions of their experiences with the process of developing and writing nursing care plans. Additional sources of data were provided through participant observation, document review, and field journal entries.

Data were analyzed using Colaizzi's guidelines for protocol analysis. One hundred four significant statements were identified from the taped interviews. Meanings were formulated through the phenomenological operations of intuiting, reduction, and imaginative variation. Thirteen themes emerged from the aggregated meanings, rendering three theme clusters which were interpreted as developmental stages in a journey of personal and professional socialization.

An exhaustive description of the experience of developing and writing nursing care plans as lived by senior level baccalaureate nursing students uncovered the fundamental structure or essential characteristics of the experience, which was validated by thirteen of the original twenty-three informants. The findings revealed a journey of struggle and frustration but also one of accomplishment and satisfaction. Ultimately, the informants perceived the nursing care plan experience as worthwhile because of the outcomes of knowledge, skills and values which enabled them to grasp the nursing perspective, to think and feel like a nurse.

Descriptions of student perspectives of everyday activities in nursing education offer nursing educators insight into the meaning of those experiences for students. The findings of this study may suggest new ways of thinking and new possibilities in relation to the nursing care plan experience for students. This research also contributes to the existing knowledge about the phenomenological approach as a useful method for research in nursing education and practice.
Notes: Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 53-12, Section: B, page: 6218.

Thesis (D.N.SC.)--WIDENER UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF NURSING, 1992.

School code: 0969.