The Significance of Continuing Education for Registered Nurses

The Significance of Continuing Education for Registered Nurses
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The Significance of Continuing Education for Registered Nurses
1.0. Introduction
The creation of legal, organizational, economic and methodological conditions for the educational opportunities of nursing is considered as one of the most critical steps in the health care system. The provision of continuing education to registered nurses ascertains improvement in the overall enhancement of the health care system. The rationale of providing continuing education is to emphasize the need of improvement in the quality, availability and cost-effectiveness of medical care, effective use of health care resources, and reduction of direct and indirect losses of society by reducing morbidity and mortality rates among the population.
2.0. Literature Review
2.1. Nurse Residency Programs
The “Institute of Medicine and the Joint Commission” encouraged the health care institutes for providing specialized nursing residency program, particularly for the licensed nurses who are recently employed. Coventry, Maslin‐Prothero, & Smith (2015) reviewed the literature to explore the existing residency programs intended for continuing education for nurses and evaluated the significance of these programs for career development of nurses. Their research was based on the integrative review method that presented the perspectives of registered nurses on the professional concerned area of continual education. Data was collected from the researches published from February 2001 to 2015, by using explicit keywords, such as registered nurses, staffing, workload, shortage, continuing professional development, nurse and patient ratio, supply, professional development, continuing education, barrier and deterrent. They extracted 11 studies and utilized an organized approach for data evaluation and literature search as well as for presentation and analysis.
The results indicated that nurse practitioners were reluctant and obstructed to leave to the workplace for attending the program of continuing professional development. Although the study provides extensive evidence, there were some limitations as well. For instance, the search was limited to English language paper, yielding a limited number of researches. Furthermore, the included studies already had weaknesses in the methodological and sampling techniques, so these undermined the validity of this review.
2.2. Organizational Impact of CPD Opportunities for Nurses
The registered nurses are anticipated to take active participation in the CPD programs in order to maintain their professional competence and registration (Cziraki, Read, Spence Laschinger, & Wong, 2018). In this regard, Letourneau and Fater (2015) conducted research to examine the perceptions of registered nurses regarding continuing education while they were working in a health care setting. They used a similar approach as mentioned in the last research by Coventry, Maslin‐Prothero, & Smith (2015). However, as compared to that research, this research involved the articles published between July 2006 and 2013. They used the “Cumulative Index of Nursing and Allied Health Literature” (CINAHL) to search for the nurse residency programs.
The results indicated that the nurses were showing unwilling to leave their health setting for attending the CPD programs. As a consequence of this, career retention, recruitment, job satisfaction, conservation of professional registration, quality patient care, provision of safe care, and competence to practice are potentially diverted. Additionally, a number of limitations have been observed in the research, such as non-experimental design and small convenience samples of the empirical studies included in the research. Moreover, many participants in the researches functioned as own control for the single-sample design
The educational opportunities regarding technologies for the implementation of innovative medical services in nursing practice contribute to the optimization of resource provision, improve the quality of nursing care, and optimize its control (Risling, 2017). Therefore, an increase in the professional responsibility of nursing specialists will result in expanding their role in health care services through the rational distribution of participants in the provision of medical care.
2.3. CPD & Career Satisfaction
The inclusion of registered nurse practitioners in continuing educational programs is likely to increase career satisfaction and job retention among them (Alotaibi, Paliadelis, & Valenzuela, 2016). Brekelmans, Maassen, Weststrate, & Geurdes (2016) investigated the association among the factors which affect the participation of registered nurses in the CPD programs working in the Netherlands. They used an exploratory approach for cross-sectional study using quantitative data collection methods with a validated research tool, i.e. “Questionnaire Professional Development of Nurses” (Q-PDN) they included a total of 5500 registered nurses by means of convenience sampling working in the Dutch university hospital and other general hospitals. A total of 1226 registered nurses completed the questionnaire and returned. The results revealed that the activity for CPD was affected by particular motives. It was indicated that if the health care institutes encourage the registered nurse practitioners and develop their interest in continuing education, the nurses will anticipate pursuing it for their career development and satisfaction. The career satisfaction among nurses can also be associated with the development of research and innovation activities of nursing staff, carrying out comprehensive research projects aimed at the development of health care in the region. A major limitation of the research was that it did not include the influence of environment, i.e. workplace or organisation in the research as most of the above mentioned studies were focused on the environment as a major factor.
3.0. Conclusion
The provision of continuing education to the employed registered nurses is expected to improve the participation of nursing professionals in research, educational programs, innovative projects, corporate events, scientific and practical, and other conferences. It will result in improving the system of effective use of nursing personnel, depending on the level of education and the basic speciality. To provide healthcare institutions with the nurse having a secondary medical education, it is necessary to continue the development of a multi-level system of professional education and CPD programs.