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Effects of the presence of student nurses on

the performance of staff nurses as perceived


by the staff nurses themselves

A thesis to be presented to the


faculty of the College of Nursing of St. Jude College Manila

In partial fulfillment of the requirements of the


Degree of Bachelor Science in Nursing

By

BSN 3B – Group 3

Group Leader
Suriben, Mary Ann R.

Members
Mangahas, Sherwin Jayson
Naces, Daniel Miguel
Perdido, Rosalie
Reyes, Jennifer P.
Rivera, Jocelyn
Venturillo, Ethel Florence
Victorio, Beninia
Visperas, Christine Joyce
Zacarias, Jeff Michael

January 2009

Background of the Study


All over the world, health care is in demand. Indeed not one can
ignore the fact that health is one of our outmost priorities. Everyday,
millions of people are admitted to hospitals, taking medicines,
undergoing minor and major surgeries, seeking consultations from
medical professionals and many others.

However, according to a survey reported in the New England


Journal of Medicine December 2002, found on a website
(http://www.kff.org), more than one-third of practicing physicians and
forty percent of the public say that they or a family member has
experienced medical errors. In addition to that, Dr. Linda Aiken (2002)
in her study found out that approximately one-fifth of the total
mortality, (up to 98,000 deaths) that occur each year is due to medical
errors. And when we say medical errors we could not deny the fact
that nurses play a great role in providing health services. Thus, Mary
Nusawakan (2006) highlighted the fact that people can die when
nursing care is inadequate.

With the emergence of nursing schools in the Philippines and a


huge number of nursing students, hospital – nursing school affiliations
are thereby increasing as well. And since cost cutting is a common
scenario especially now that the whole world is under economic crisis,
hospitals especially public, are relying more on student nurses guided
by a clinical instructor in giving patient care. Indeed, manpower
coming from their employed staff nurses is not enough to serve a great
number of clients in need of health services. Moreover, a study done
by Ancheta in 1996 revealed that a low ratio of registered nurses to
semi-professional and non-professional personnel prevented the
former to tie themselves down to patient care, but to remain free to
manage and direct the bedside care given by others.
Gordon (1960) as cited in the study done by Alvar in 2002, stated
that recognition or being looked up to and admired, being considered
important, attracting favorable notice, achieving recognition plays an
important role in determining one’s behavior. Also, Bittel (1960; (Alvar
2002)) said that relationship exists between behavior (e.g.
performance) and values, so that if a value is predominant a
corresponding behavior is manifested.

Thus the researchers would want to know if the presence of


student nurses affects the staff nurses performance, since student
nurses can be one of the stimuli for their performance. As students,
they would be observing the prior’s skills and attitude and modeling is
one possible outcome. Hence, motivation to do better is one possibility
that the researchers would want to find. Furthermore, another
possibility is that staff nurses would feel superior over the students and
would just be delegating most if not all the tasks to the students. The
tendency is for the staff nurses to be lax since another would be doing
the job and he or she will be lifted of from the responsibility.

The researchers find this study of relevance since nursing care


plays an important role in client’s health. In addition, determining the
effect of the presence of student nurses to the performance of student
nurses would open the doors for improvement of nursing care.
Moreover, it is a fact that negligence and malpractice happens more in
the clinical setting especially in public hospitals wherein most people
seeking medical help are underprivileged and would just choose to
remain silent than spend money to exercise their legal rights.
Statement of the Problem

The strength of a tendency to act in a certain way depends on


the strength of an expectation that the act will be followed by a given
outcome and on the attractiveness of the outcome to the individual. In
the Clinical setting, staff nurses in the presence of student nurses
could either feel motivated to do better, feel lax as their responsibility
would be passed onto someone else or just feel passive. These are just
some of the possibilities that need to be identified since nursing care
plays an important role in client’s health and recovery.

Statement of the Purpose

The purpose of the study is to determine the effect of the


presence of student nurses on the staff nurses’ clinical performance as
determined by the staff nurses themselves.

Research Question

What is the effect of the presence of the student nurses to the


clinical performance of the staff nurses as perceived by the latter?

Null Hypothesis

As perceived by the staff nurses themselves, the presence of


student nurses has no effect on their clinical performance.

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