Abstract:
The purposes of this descriptive research were to examine the nursing process implementation of professional nurses in Burapha University Hospital, Health Science Center, Burapha University and to compare the implementation in different units. A random sample of three hundred nineteen nursing process records of professional nurses were recruited in this study. The research instrument was a check list of five steps of nursing process, generated by the researcher. The content validity of the instrument was obtained by using a panel of experts. The interrater reliability of Polit & Humgler was .93. Percentage, mean, one way analysis of variances and LSD method were used to analyze data.
The findings of the study were as follows:
1. The nussing process implementation of overall steps of professional nurses was at lowest level. When each step of nursing process was considered, the results indicated that implementation step was at the highest level whereas the planning of care was at the lowest level.
2. The nursing process implementation performed by professional nurses in common ward, special ward, obstetric unit and intensive care unit had statistically significant difference at .05 level. When the nursing specialty was considered, it was found that professional nurses in obstetric unit had the highest level of implementation whereas the professional nurses in intensive care unit had lowest level of implementation.
3. There was statistically significant difference at .05 level in each step of nursing process implementation performed by professional nurses in four different units. Howerver, the results indicated no statistically significant difference at .05 level in the step of planning of care
Conclusion: It was recommended that professional nurses should be encouraged to perform nursing process implementation.