Community nurses' opinion on the need to introduce specialization in community health care

Ciljevi: Ispitati mišljenje patronažnih sestara u Republici Hrvatskoj o potrebi za uvođenjem specijalizacije u patronažnu zdravstvenu zaštitu. Ispitati razlike u mišljenju te povezanost mišljenja o potrebi za specijalizacijom patronažnih sestara/tehničara s obzirom na spol, dob, mjesto stanovanja, zvanje, radni status, završeno srednjoškolsko obrazovanje i dužinu radnoga staža. Ispitanici i metode: Provedena je presječna studija na 272 ispitanika. Ispitanici su bile patronažne sestre/tehničari. Proveo se anonimni anketni upitnik putem Google Sheets-a. Upitnik se sastojao od dva djela. U prvom dijelu ispitivali su se demografski podaci ispitanika. Drugi dio sastojao se od 21 čestice. Ispitanici su u drugom dijelu svoje mišljenje iznosili pomoću Likertove skale od 1 do 5. Rezultati: U istraživanju od ukupnog broja ispitanika njih 100 (36,8 %) potpuno se složilo sa tvrdnjom da je u profesiji sestrinstva potrebna specijalizacija za patronažne sestre, a njih 92 (33,8 %) se uglavnom složilo s istom tvrdnjom. Zaključak: Postoji statistički značajna razlika u mišljenju patronažnih sestara/tehničara o potrebi za uvođenjem specijalizacije u patronažnu zdravstvenu zaštitu s obzirom na dob, zvanje, dužinu radnoga staža i županiju zaposlenja.Aims: Examine the opinion of community nurses in the Republic of Croatia on the need of introducing specialization in community health care. Examine the differences in opinion as well as the link between opinions about the need for specialization of community nurses/technicians regarding sex, age, home address, profession, employment status, completed high school education and the length of service. Subjects and methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted on 272 subjects. The subjects were community nurses. An anonymous Google Sheets questionnaire was conducted. It was a two-part questionnaire. In the first part the subjects’ demographic data was examined. The second part consisted of 21 claims where the subjects expressed their opinions ranging from 1 to 5 on Likert scale. Results: A hundred subjects (36.8%) completely agreed with the claim that a community nursing profession requires specialization for community nurses, and 92 of them (33.8%) mostly agreed with the same claim. Conclusion: There is a statistically significant difference in opinion of community nurses/technicians about the need of introducing specialization in community health care regarding age, profession, the length of service and the county of employment