Study of Newborn Professional Nurses’ Competency Levels at Sakon Nakhon Hospital

Abstract

               This research and development research aimed to study the neonatal professional nurses’ competency levels at Sakon Nakhon Hospital. The study was conducted from September, 2022 to April 2023 in 2 phases; 1) developed the assessment form based on the Marrelly et al.’s conceptual framework using 7 Samples and 2) assessed the competency level of 15 neonatal professional nurses. The tools used were the questionnaires consisted of 7 aspects of neonatal professional nurses’ competency with the content validity index of 1.0 and the Cronbach’s alpha coefficient of 0.94. Data were collected by content grouping and analyzed by the percentage, average (x ̅ ) and standard deviation (S.D.).

              The results showed that the neonatal professional nurses’ competency assessment form consisted of 7 aspects; 1) Assessment of the health status of newborn 2) Neonatal Nursing Practice 3) Promotion of breastfeeding 4) Safety and infection prevention 5) Communication, Information and Coordination 6) Drug/fluid administration and 7) Use of medical equipment and technology. The assessment of nurses’ competency levels showed that they had the very good level in the safety and infection prevention aspect (x ̅ = 4.61, S.D. = 0.55). Followed by the good competency levels which were the aspect of neonatal nursing practice and use of medical equipment and technology (x ̅ = 4.48, S.D. = 0.69), assessment of the health status of newborn (x ̅ = 4.28, S.D. = 0.68), promotion of breastfeeding (x ̅ = 4.24, S.D. = 0.75), drug administration (x ̅ = 4.23, S.D. = 0.68) and the communication, information and coordination (x ̅ = 4.00, S.D. = 0.63). Therefore, these results should be used as a guideline for developing the developing plan and supervising professional nurses who provide services for newborns in the future.

                Keywords: Professional nurse competency form, Professional Nurses, Newborn baby