Assessment of Perception of Diploma Nursing Students on Clinical Performance: Case of Nursing Training Institutions in Tanzania

Abstract

Background: Clinical performance refers to the extent to which a student nurse delivers clinical services that are appropriately to each patient's condition. Its impact is not limited to grades but also to the extent a student nurse delivers quality and cost-effective clinical services that are appropriately to each patient's condition.

Objective: Current study intended to assess perception of diploma nursing students on   clinical performance in Lake and central zone, Tanzania.

Method: Analytical cross-sectional study with quantitative research approach. The study involved 488 respondents who were systematically randomly selected. Respondents were selected from public and private Nursing training institutions in Tanzania which were randomly selected by stratified sampling method. Self-administered structured questionnaires were used as the main primary data collection tool while documentary review was for secondary data. Statistical package for service solution (SPSS v.23) was used for data entry, cleaning, processing and analysis.

Results: Study revealed that 59.9% of the respondents had appositive perception towards clinical performance grades and 71.3% respondents had a high clinical performance. The study also showed a statistically significant association of sex (AOR: 6.7, 95%CI: 1.6-4.7, p=0.008) and campus (AOR: 43.82, 95%CI: 34.21-54.4, p<0.001) with perception on clinical performance.

Conclusion: findings of the currents study are evident that despite of the unsatisfactory clinical learning environment, inadequate qualified clinical staffs and inadequate medical supplies and equipment, majority of nurse students had positive perception on clinical performance which concurred with good clinical performance. Some socio-demographic characteristics were observed to influence the levels of perception and clinical performance including accommodation status, sex, gender and area of residence.