EVALUATION OF THE EXTENT OF ACHIEVING CLINICAL COMPETENCIES IN MIDWIFERY STUDENTS AND ITS RELATION WITH SOME OF THE DEMOGRAPHIC FACTORS

  Studies in the field of clinical competence assessment of midwifery students and related factors have contradictory and sometimes unexpected results. Given the role of clinical competence in the quality of midwifery care and Its importance in protecting the health of mothers and babies, This study aims to Determining the extent of achieving clinical competencies and its relation with some of the demographic factors in midwifery students. This quasi-experimental study was conducted on 73 midwifery students and 438 pregnant women in 2015. Data was collected using clinical competence questionnaire, which was completed in two ways by self-assessment and assessment by researcher. Data analysis was performed applying Descriptive statistics, Spearman and Pearson correlations tests and One-way ANOVA test in SPSS software, version 16. Midwifery students assessed their clinical competence with a mean (109.84 ± 12.12) at a good level and the researcher the clinical competence of midwifery students with mean (70.92 ± 17.41) At the Medium level. The results of the study showed there is a significant difference between the self-assessment and evaluation by the researcher (p <0.05) But there is no significant relationship between self-assessment and evaluation by the researcher (p >0.05). Also, there is a significant and positive correlation between self-assessment of clinical competency and marital status (p <0.05). This study shows that self-assessment is not an appropriate alternative to assessing professors but at the same time it can be used as a complementary evaluation method to evaluate students' performance.