وضعیت آموزش بالینی از دیدگاه دانشجویان پرستاری و مامایی دانشگاه علوم پزشکی زنجان

Background and Objectives: Clinical education is an important part of nursing and midwifery curriculum and is a main basis for clinical skills and professional competencies of students. Improvement of clinical education requires awareness of clinical environment. The aim of this study was to evaluate quality of clinical education in teaching hospitals affiliated with Zanjan University of Medical Sciences from the viewpoints of nursing and midwifery students. Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional study was done on 100 nursing and midwifery students who were studying in their second and third academic year and were selected by census method at Zanjan University of Medical Science in 2012- 2013.  A two-part questionnaire was used to collect data. The first part assessed demographic data and the second part evaluated clinical education status which included 33 items in following five domains; purpose and educational curriculum, instructor characteristics, educational environment characteristics, quality of interactions between students and other staff, and supervision and evaluation. Data was analyzed using descriptive statistics and t- test using SPSS ver. 17. Results: Results showed that among five domains of clinical education, goals and educational planning and instructor’s characteristics were reported as moderate or high levels. But the quality of interaction with students, characteristics of educational environment and supervision and evaluation were reported as moderate or low levels. There were no significant differences on domains of clinical education between nursing and midwifery students. Conclusion: Although some aspects of clinical education were estimated as moderate or high level, but there were still some weak points that disrupted the integrated chain of clinical education. Therefore, it is necessary to give clinical education consideration in order to strengthen the positive aspects and modify the weaknesses to improve its quality.