Barriers To Implementation Of Nursing Process Among Nurses Working In Narok County Referral Hospital

Globally, nursing process has gained popularity and is utilized in hospitals to offer quality individual nursing care to patients. It is utilized by nurses in clinical setup to offer quality nursing care to patients individually as unique and having special needs. Nursing process non-implementation can lead to poor nursing care to patients in healthcare institutions. This study therefore assessed barriers of nursing process implementation by Narok County Referral Hospital (NCRH) nurses. A descriptive cross sectional study design was used to collect data from 102 conveniently sampled nurses in NCRH. The study instruments used were self-administered questionnaires and key informant interview. SPSS version 20.0 was used to analyze quantitative data and sample characteristics were analyzed using mean and median. Qualitative data was thematically analyzed and presented in tables. Association between the study variables was calculated using chi square at 95% level of significance while statistical significance of results obtained was calculated using p values of 0.05. Approval was sought from relevant authorities. The study findings may be of importance to Health institution managers, policy makers, nurses and patients in terms of improving service delivery, reduction in mortality and morbidity as well as  length of stay of patients. The study results showed that female participants were the majority(70.6%). Most participants (71.6%) had attained diploma level of education and among them, 92.2% had received training in nursing process. Majority 95 (93.2%) were observed not to implement nursing process and of those who implemented, only 1 (1%) correctly outlined all the steps, a sign of poor nursing process implementation. NP implementation was of statistical significance with age of nurses (p =0.001) since 18 out of 29 of younger nurses aged 21-30 years were found to actively practice it. This finding showed that younger nurses were found to implement NP more compared to their older counterparts. Work experience (p = 0.015) was also of statistical significance since the study results showed that recently qualified nurses with working experience of 10 yrs and below (p=0.015) had high likelihood of implementing NP at 64.7% in relation to their counterparts who are older in the profession. Those who were between 11-15 years accounted for 26.3% while 29.4% were aged 16 years and above. This finding shows that nurses who are fresh from school practiced what they learnt and try to do the ideal as opposed to their counterparts who have remained in service for many years.  On the other hand, institutional factors (p=0.075) had no significant relationship with NP implementation except on the supply of necessary tools (p=0.001) and implementation of NP. Availability of materials was seen to impact positively NP implementation. The interview also revealed less commitment by the hospital administration to supporting nurses in implementation of the NP. Therefore, the study recommends that nursing process mainstreaming interventions such as regular staff refresher courses, mentorship in the hospitals, availability of relevant resources, change of attitude by nurses, hospital managers commitment towards supporting NP activities and nurses, can highly improve NP implementation and prevent the above obstacles