THE KNOWLEDGE AND ATTITUDE OF NURSES WORKING IN EMERGENCY DEPARTMENTS TOWARD THE NURSING PROCESS

The knowledge and attitude of nurses are among the main factors in the application of the nursing process and its implementation in the patient care. Thus, this study was conducted to investigate the knowledge and attitude of nurses regarding the nursing process in the emergency departments (8 centers) of Tabriz University of Medical Sciences.

This descriptive research was conducted in the Emergency Departments of Medical and Educational centers of Tabriz University of Medical Sciences. Two hundred and sixty-three emergency nurses were included in the study. Sampling was done by census method and nurses completed the electronic questionnaire of knowledge and attitude toward the nursing process. Finally, the data was analyzed using SPSS v22.

 The results show that the overall mean score of attitude toward the nursing process is 50.33, and the overall mean score of awareness towards the nursing process is 24.19; both of them are at the average range. Also, the results show a statistically significant relationship between the nurses' age and the nurses' experience with their knowledge (p=0.016).

According to the results of the study, it can be concluded that although the nurses' level of knowledge and attitude about the nursing process was average, they accepted the nursing process as a care framework. Investigating the items of the questionnaire showed that the nursing process implementation is time-consuming and also is mainly written. Therefore, it is possible to empower and encourage nurses to use the nursing process quickly by using the necessary training and eliminating unnecessary tasks.