Midwives' experience of their clinical education at a nursing college in Swaziland

M.Cur.Poor quality of midwifery care has been of major concern in Swaziland. This has been attributed to a number of reasons of which one is the education of midwifery students. The research question has been, "To what extent has the clinical learning of midwifery students produced competent midwives in the country?" The question has been answered by exploring the clinical learning experience of the midwifery students in a college in Swaziland. Data were collected by means of a focus group interview. Two groups each comprising of five participants were interviewed separately. Data was analysed following the steps provided by Tesch (1990) as quoted by Creswell (1994:153-155). From the findings factors that impacted either positively or negatively on the clinical learning of students were discovered. Because of the presence of more negative factors the conclusion was that the clinical learning of midwifery students produces competent midwives to a lesser extent. Recommendations to form the basis for the strategies to improve the clinical learning of the students were outlined. Validity and reliability has been maintained through out the study. Ethical standards for researchers as stipulated by DENOSA have been considered in the whole study