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. 2017 Nov 17:16:65.
doi: 10.1186/s12912-017-0264-9. eCollection 2017.

Nurses' competencies in home healthcare: an interview study

Henrik Andersson  1 , Maria Lindholm  2 , Margareta Pettersson  2 , Lise-Lotte Jonasson  1
Affiliations

Nurses' competencies in home healthcare: an interview study

Henrik Andersson et al. BMC Nurs. .

Abstract

Background: Nurses working in Home healthcare (HHC) are facing major challenges since more advanced care and treatment are increasingly being carried out in patients' homes. The aim of this study has been to explore how nurses experience their competencies in HHC situations.

Methods: This study has a qualitative and explorative design. Ten nurses were interviewed and data was analyzed using content analysis.

Results: The themes "Being a capable nurse", "Being a useful nurse" and "Being a subordinate and dependent nurse" were identified. Nurses want to be capable of taking care of patients, to develop their competencies and to perform their duties in the way required. They also want their work to be useful and to provide good and safe HHC. Finally, nurses want to improve HHC care by applying their competencies. Simultaneously, they are subordinate and dependent in relation to their manager and also dependent upon their manager's interest in encouraging nurses' competence development.

Conclusions: Nurses in HHC are responsible for many seriously ill patients and they want to contribute to good and safe patient care. To maintain patient safety, reduce the risk for burnout and staff turnover as well as to contribute to a sustainable development of the work, strategies for transferring competencies between nurses and efforts for competence development are needed.

Keywords: Competence development; Competencies; Content analysis; Home healthcare; Nurses; Sustainable development.

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Conflict of interest statement

Ethics approval and consent to participate

No formal ethical approval was required for this study according to The Swedish Code of Statutes, The law concerning research relating to humans (2003:460). The research has been performed according to correct ethical practice outlined in the Declaration of Helsinki and adheres to Swedish laws and regulations concerning informed consent and confidentiality. Written informed consent was obtained from all participants prior to any data collection.

Consent for publication

Not applicable.

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Publisher’s Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

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