Abstract
Aim: This study seeks to analyse the care plans prepared by the nursing students in the clinical practice of the course of Internal Medicine Nursing.
Methods: The population of this descriptive study consists of 320 course plans prepared by the students attending the course of Internal Medicine Nursing at a health college. The sample of the study consists of 182 care plans, which met the inclusion criteria of the study. The data were obtained through the “Evaluation Criteria Form for Internal Medicine Nursing Care Plans”, “the 2015-2017 North American Nursing Diagnosis Association”, and “the Student Training Module for the Practice of Internal Medicine Nursing”.
Results: The study concluded that a total of 52 nursing diagnoses, including at least one for each area, for 10 out of 13 NANDA areas were made by the students. The top three nursing diagnoses were “activity intolerance”, “acute pain” and “disrupted sleep patterns.” The study also determined the nursing process phases performed by the students and found that majority of the students were competent in the phases of descriptive characteristics, associated factors, outcome determination, and planning.
Conclusion: The study revealed that the students competent in preparing a care plan for physiological problems were in majority and that the students had the most problems in the evaluation phase.