Knowledge, Practice and Barriers to the Use of Nursing Process and Standardised Nursing Languages in Selected Hospitals in Nigeria

Background: The Nursing Process and the Standardised Nursing Languages (SNLs) were incorporated into nursing practice to improve documentation of care. Aims: This necessitates the need to assess the knowledge, practice and barriers to the use of Nursing Process and Standardised Nursing Languages. Methods: This study adopted a descriptive cross sectional research design. Questionnaires were used to obtain data from clinical nurses in the University College Hospital and Adeoyo Maternity Hospital, Ibadan. A simple random technique was used to select 337 nurses who participated in the study. Data was analysed using IBM SSPS version 25.0. Results were presented using frequency distribution and association between variables were tested using chi square at p value ≤ 0.05. Results: The respondents were within the age group 21-30 years and majority (89.6%) were female. Half (50%) of the clinical nurses have a good knowledge of both the nursing process and the standardised nursing languages. Also, 59% of the nurses have a good practice of nursing process and 41% have a good practice of the standardised nursing languages. The major barriers identified to the use of the nursing process and standardised nursing language were (lack of funding for nursing process 63.5% and inadequate knowledge for SNLs 67.4%). There is a statistically significant association in the knowledge of nurses on the nursing process and standardised nursing languages and age with p value ≤ 0.00. Conclusion: it was revealed in the study that more nurses practice the nursing process than the SNLs. Therefore, there is a need for further training on SNLs. Also, the reference books on SNLs should be made available to nurses on the wards.