An investigation of clinical assessment processes of student nurses in Jackarta, Indonesia

Nursing in Indonesia is attempting to achieve a higher standard of education to enable nurses to migrate to global areas of nursing shortages. Assessment of nursing practice during undergraduate nursing education in Indonesia requires investigation to assist in achieving a higher standard of education. For assessment to occur, there are several variables reported in the literature that must be included in the process of assessment, that is assessors, students, methods and tools of measurement as well as clinical environment. It is acknowledged that those factors influence the successfulness of the clinical assessment process. The purpose of this descriptive exploratory study utilising a self report clinical instructor and student nurse questionnaire was to investigate the clinical assessment of Indonesian student nurses undertaking the professional stage of the undergraduate nursing course. Specifically, the study investigated how clinical teachers assess student nurses and how students perceive the clinical assessment process. Data were collected from four nursing institutions in Jakarta, Indonesia during July 2006. Quantitative and qualitative data analysis were undertaken to meet the purpose and objectives of the study. Quantitative data analysis utilised frequency tables, cross tabulations and ANOVA. Participants' responses to open-ended items were analysed using content analysis procedures. The findings of this study have shown that there are many important issues surrounding the assessment of Indonesian student nurses, such as the model of assessment process employed and the characteristics of clinical instructors, students and clinical environment. From this study, it was revealed that the assessment of student nurses employed skilledv based assessment, despite the global trends towards competency-based assessment.;Findings from this study also illustrate that nursing education development has been occurring in Indonesia with already half of the clinical instructor participants being educated to master's level and most student nurse participants held diploma III qualifications prior to their Bachelor of Nursing course, which means that they want to continue their study to a higher level. However, improvement in nursing curriculum which focuses on competency-based curriculum is needed. Improvement in the nursing curriculum will lead to improvements in the nursing profession. That is a higher standards of professionalism for nursing and nurses in Indonesia. Recommendations from the study include promoting changes in curriculum, particularly regarding the assessment process to employ competency-based assessment for student nurses. This study also endorses the use of a standardized assessment in clinical setting. In addition, further research related to replication of the study at a national level and comparison of clinical assessment in other countries should be conducted.