Nursing students’ willingness to care for older adults in Turkey in 2020

The population of older adults is dramatically increasing in the world. This increase results in more demand for health care services from older adults. So, nurses’ and nursing students’ willingness to care for older adults gain importance. The aim of the study was to determine the willingness of nursing students to care for older adults and the factors affecting this in Turkey.

This descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted between November-December 2019 in the nursing faculty of a public university. 299 students were randomly selected and data were collected by using a demographic student form and the Willingness to Care for Older People scale. Data were analyzed via the SPSS version 25 program.

The great majority (90.3%) of the students were female and the mean age was 21.3±1.2 years. The mean score of the students' willingness to care for the elderly was 36.82±5.96. The willingness to care for the older adults was found to be affected by caring for the older adults in clinical practice (B=2.136, β=0.174, p=0.008) and wanting to live with an elderly relative (B=2.022, β=0.168, p=0.016).

The experience of caring for an older adult in clinical practice and to be willing to live with an older relative in the same house is positively associated with the willingness of student nurses to consider geriatric nursing as an option.