Registered nurses' education and their views on competence development in municipal elderly care in Sweden: a questionnaire survey.

BACKGROUND: Recent changes of municipal elderly care in Sweden have resulted in that persons 65 years and older, previously nursed in hospital facilities, are now being cared for in the municipality. This change has had a significant impact on the work situation of registered nurses (RNs) and calls for appropriate educational preparation to enable RNs to undertake their new roles effectively.

AIM: The main focus was to describe RNs' education and their view of competence development in municipal elderly care. Another aim was to compare RNs working solely in dementia care (DC) with those working in general elder care (GC) of older persons with diverse diagnoses.

DESIGN: A non-experimental, descriptive design with a survey research approach was used.

SETTINGS: Sixty special housing with subunits including those offering daytime activities in a large city in the middle of Sweden.

PARTICIPANTS: The number of participating RNs was a total of 213, with a response rate of 62.3%. Of the 213 RNs, 95 (44.6%) worked in DC, and 118 (55.4%) in GC.

METHOD: A questionnaire survey.

RESULTS: The findings showed that RNs possessed a broad range of competence. The majority lacked a bachelor's degree in nursing. Few had adequate specialist competence. RNs' in DC wanted to invest more in competence development whereas RNs in GC were more motivated to attain greater authority in the making of important decisions and to seek another position.

CONCLUSION: An important future prospect is to develop the competence of RNs in elderly care. In order to ensure high quality and security in elderly care, it is also essential to increase the number of RNs with specialist competence.