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| ORIGINAL ARTICLE |
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| Year : 2022 | Volume
: 10
| Issue : 2 | Page : 76-82 |
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Perception of nursing faculty towards their preferred profession across the India: A cross sectional descriptive study
VA Raghu, SK Mohana Sundari
Faculty in Nursing, College of Nursing, AIIMS, Jodhpur, Rajasthan, India
| Date of Submission | 27-Sep-2022 |
| Date of Decision | 25-Nov-2022 |
| Date of Acceptance | 13-Dec-2022 |
| Date of Web Publication | 16-May-2023 |
Correspondence Address:
V A Raghu
College of Nursing, AIIMS, Jodhpur, Rajasthan
India
 Source of Support: None, Conflict of Interest: None
DOI: 10.4103/jihs.jihs_9_22
Background: India is the country that produces the majority of nurses, and nurses are the core of the country's health-care system. The nurses can pursue a career in clinical work or teaching. The performance of the nursing faculties is significantly influenced by their perception toward preferred profession. The objective of the study was to assess the perception of nursing faculties toward their preferred profession. Methodology: All four areas of India – the east, west, north, and south - were covered in a cross-sectional descriptive study that involved 300 nursing faculties. The samples were contacted through direct approach and electronic mode by circulating the survey link created by SurveyMonkey App. Five-point Likert scale, which comprises total 15 statements, was used to collect data. After filling informed consent, the participants were asked to fill the questionnaire. Results: Nearly 2/3rd of the subjects (188) had a favorable perception toward their preferred profession and more than 1/3rd (112) of them had an unfavorable perception. Binary logistic regression analysis indicated that marital status (P = 0.000; adjusted odds ratio [AOR]: 0.100; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.36–0.280), qualification (P = 0.010; AOR: 2.194; 95% CI: 1.205–3.993), and clinical experience (P = 0.011; AOR: 2.013; 95% CI: 1.173–3.454) had a significant influence the perception of faculty. Conclusion: Almost half of the subjects expressed negative perceptions. Although perception is a personal psychological factor, the government, professional bodies, and nurse managers can take the necessary steps to address the issue that dissatisfy nursing faculty can promote positive perception and that would impact their high-quality performance.
Keywords: Clinical experience and profession, nursing faculty, perception, qualification
How to cite this article:
Raghu V A, Mohana Sundari S K. Perception of nursing faculty towards their preferred profession across the India: A cross sectional descriptive study. J Integr Health Sci 2022;10:76-82 |
How to cite this URL:
Raghu V A, Mohana Sundari S K. Perception of nursing faculty towards their preferred profession across the India: A cross sectional descriptive study. J Integr Health Sci [serial online] 2022 [cited 2023 Jun 9];10:76-82. Available from: https://www.jihs.in/text.asp?2022/10/2/76/377155 |
| Introduction | |  |
One of the oldest and most honorable professions in the world is nursing, which reminds us of the first nurse leader Florence Nightingale.[1] The nurses provide significant contribution to improve the patient outcomes. The COVID-19 has emphasized the significance of nurses as front-line medical personnel.[1] The perception of the individuals also affects their performance and the quality of the services they provide, in addition to their education, competence, and expertise. According to the department of labor statistics, nursing is a career that is absolutely required throughout the world. In the United States, there are more than 2.5 million registered nurses.[2] The nursing profession is a career and a service to humanity, not merely a job.[3]
In India, on an average, the nurse-to-population ratio is 1.96 per 1000 population, which is less than the WHO standard.[4] In India, there were 1.79 million registered nurses and around 7 lakh ANM present in 2014.[5] Despite the fact that nursing schools are sprouting up everywhere, India still needs 1.94 million more nurses.[6] In India, the health-care institution is understaffed with full-time nurses.[7] Everyday, nursing education is becoming more demanding as well challenging profession in developing country like India.[8]
The goal of nurse educators is to prepare and educate future nurses, and their work is crucially significant to the health-care delivery system.[9] In light of the current nurse's shortages and the increasing need for nurses, more nursing educators are required to train the future nurses, which might be a very promising career path.[10] The knowledge, skill, perception, pay of the nursing faculty, and working conditions in the nursing educational institution are some of the elements that have an impact on the nursing education and quality of nursing services. Nursing programs must train future nursing faculty to give the best theory and practice to increase the standard of health care. This might help in preparing competent and talented future nurses to uphold professional standards and provide patients with quality treatment.[11]
Nursing faculty have an important job in the health-care profession. They are responsible for strengthening the nursing workforce, serving as role models, and inculcate the leadership quality to implement evidence-based practice. The nursing faculty perform the dual role in classroom and in clinical.[12]
The perception of the student's nurse will be influenced by the perceptions of the nursing faculty. The faculty's perception about their work, profession, workplace, and administration will serve as a predictor of the behavior and performance that will have a significant effect on the standard of patient care.[13] People's perceptions are based on personal preferences, but a variety of elements, including the workplace environment, leadership style, opportunities for professional advancement, and job satisfaction, affect nursing faculty members' perceptions of their profession. The perception of the nursing faculty plays a critical influence in shaping the student's behavior as an individual and as a professional. The majority of research conducted in India focused on how students, nurses employed in clinical settings, and the general public perceived about the nursing profession. However, none of the studies assessed the perception of nursing faculties who are working in educational institution. Therefore, the objective of the research was to determine how nursing faculty perceived their preferred profession.
| Methodology | | |
Study design and setting
Nursing faculty were the subjects of a descriptive cross-sectional survey to determine their perception of their preferred profession. Each region of India was examined by the researcher (North East, West, North, and South India).
Participants
A total of 300 nursing faculties were contacted through direct approach as well as through electronic mode by sharing the survey link (SurveyMoney app). The subjects who are currently working as teaching faculty in any college of nursing or school of nursing in India were included in the study, the subject who resigned from teaching job and who joined in clinical area were excluded from the study. The sample size was determined using a population proportion formula (n = Z2(1−α/2) PQ/d2) and given assumptions of a 95% confidence level, 5% margin of error, and 75% of population proportion. With a 10% nonresponse rate taken into account, the sample size was determined to be n = 300.
Sampling
Exponential nondiscriminative snowball sampling was applied to recruit the subjects. Here, the subject initially recruited is asked to forward the survey link to at least two similar subjects and each of them further forwarded the survey link to two more subjects.
Tools
The researcher created a tool with two sections: one for assessing baseline characteristics and the other for assessing the level of perception toward the preferred profession. It was a self-administered structured questionnaire. Baseline characteristics assessed were geographic region, age, gender, marital status, qualification, and years of teaching experience, as well as institutional and clinical experience. The Likert scale comprises 15 statements, with 10 positive and 5 negative statements. Options for each positive statement ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree with the highest score of 5 for strongly and minimum score of 1 from strongly disagree. Moreover, reverse scoring system was applied for negative worded items. Perception score was categorized into favorable and unfavorable perception. The maximum score was 75 and the minimum score was 15. The score < 50 (<67) indicates an unfavorable perception and the score > 50 (>67) indicates a favorable perception. If the score is less than 3.35 for individual item, it implies a negative perception of the given statement, and if it is more than 3.35, it suggests a favourable perception. The reliability of the Likert scale was checked by Cronbach's alpha (r = 0.792).
Ethical principles
The SurveyMonkey app had an informed consent form as an initial step to fill out before moving to the baseline characteristics and Likert scale.
Data collection method
Initially, the survey links were circulated to the known subjects through WhatsApp, E-mail, and Telegram with a request to fill them out and forward them to other known subjects. The data were collected over a 1-month period (July to August 2021) until the desired sample size was reached. Researcher stopped collecting data when response reached to 300. The response rate was 100% and no incomplete questionnaire was received by the researcher.
Statistics
The gathered data were compiled for data analysis. For statistical calculation, IBM Corp. Released 2019. IBM SPSS Statistics for Windows, Version 26. Armonk, NY: IBM Corp; 2021 was used. A statistical significance of 0.05 (P < 0.05) was adopted throughout the analysis. The descriptive statistics used were tables, figures, and mean ± standard deviation; inferential statistics used were the Chi-square test to find out the association between outcome variables and selected baseline characteristics and binary logistic regression to find out the factors influencing the level of perception of nursing faculty.
| Results | | |
Nearly 3/4th of the faculty (73.3%) were from South India, and 134 (44.7%) of the South Indians had a favorable perception and 86 (28.75%) of them had an unfavorable perception toward their preferred profession. Geographic region and level of perception had no significant association, as evident by P > 0.05 (i.e., 0.297).
More than 3/4th of the subjects (82%) aged ≥ 30 years and 150 (50%) of them had a favorable perception, while 96 (33%) of them had an unfavorable perception. The distribution of level of perception and age had no significant association as evident by P > 0.05 (i.e., 0.196).
Almost 2/3rd of the subjects (64.7%) were female faculty, and 116 (38.7%) of them had favorable perception and 78 (26%) had unfavorable perception toward their preferred profession, but the distribution of levels of perception and gender had no association as evident by P > 0.05 (i.e., 0.164).
More than 3/4th of the subjects (78.7%) were married, 132 (44%) had a favorable perception, and 104 (34.7%) had an unfavorable perception. The distribution of levels of perception and marital status had significant associations as evident by P < 0.05 (i.e., 0.000).
Furthermore, almost 2/3rd of the subjects (65.3%) were postgraduates, and 114 (38%) of them had favorable perception. More than 82 of them (27.3%) had an unfavorable perception. The distribution of perception level and qualification status had a significant association, as demonstrated by P < 0.05 (i.e., 0.027).
Almost 3/4th of the faculty had > 6 years of teaching experience and 134 (44.7%) of them had a favorable perception, as 88 (29.3%) of them had an unfavorable perception. The distribution of level of perception and years of experience had no significant association as evident by P > 0.05 (i.e., 0.164).
More than half of the subjects (55.5%) were working in the private sector. Among them, 100 (33.3%) of the faculty had a favorable perception and 66 (22%) of them had an unfavorable perception. The distribution of perception level and institution had no significant association, as evidenced by P > 0.05 (i.e., 0.334).
Moreover, nearly 2/3rd of the faculty (61.33%) had clinical experience, and 124 (41.3%) of them had a favorable perception, and 60 (20%) of them had an unfavorable perception. The distribution of level of perception and clinical experience had a significant association as evident by P < 0.05 (i.e., 0.033) [Table 1]. | Table 1: Frequency distribution of nursing faculty based on baseline characteristics and level of perception and its association (n=300)
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The frequency distribution of nursing faculty showed that nearly 2/3rd of the subjects (188) had a favorable perception toward their preferred profession and more than 1/3rd (112) of them had an unfavorable perception [Figure 1]. The mean perception score (51.53 ± 6.36) of the nursing faculty demonstrates that the nursing faculty had a favorable perception toward their preferred profession [Table 2]. | Figure 1: Percentage distribution of subject bases on perception toward preferred profession
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 | Table 2: Level of perception of nursing faculty toward preferred profession (n=300)
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Binary logistic regression analysis showed that married faculties were 0.100 times more likely to have a favourable perception than unmarried faculty ([AOR]: 0.100; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.36-0.280), postgraduate faculties were 2.194 times more likely to have a favourable perception than undergraduate faculty (AOR: 2.194; 95% CI: 1.205-3.993), and faculties who had clinical experience were 2.013 times more likely to have favourable perception than faculties without clinical experience (AOR: 2.013; 95% CI: 1.173–3.454). The result indicates that marital status, qualification, and clinical experience were the influencing factors on the level of perception of nursing faculties toward their preferred profession, as evidenced by P < 0.05 (i.e., P = 0.000, 0.010, and 0.011, respectively) [Table 3]. | Table 3: Binary logistic regression analysis to find out factors influencing level of perception of nursing faculty toward preferred profession
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Furthermore, most of the nursing faculties had a favorable perception toward 1–10 statement as evident by mean score (4.22 ± 0.87, 4.34 ± 0.86, 4.22 ± 0.85, 4.15 ± 0.90, 3.74 ± 1.15, 4.52 ± 0.72, 4.39 ± 0.78, 4.18 ± 0.87, 3.84 ± 0.97, and 3.50 ± 1.08, respectively). Most of the nursing faculties had an unfavorable perception toward statements of items from 11 to 15 as indicated by mean score (2.24 ± 1.27, 1.61 ± 0.87, 1.96 ± 0.99, 2.04 ± 0.99, and 2.52 ± 1.17) [Table 4]. | Table 4: Frequency distribution of response and level of perception (n=300)
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Majority of the nursing faculty strongly agree to the following statements such as feel proud of being in this profession, feel comfortable in teaching side, get more opportunities to gain adequate academic knowledge, get more satisfaction when nursing students perform better through their efforts, proud to express their job profile as faculty of nursing college, and ability to balance their profession and family life (n = 138, n = 162, n = 136, n = 188, n = 158, and n = 126, respectively). Majority of the nursing faculties agrees that work load, pay and working hours in teaching side is more reasonable. They also agreed that there is more scope for professional advancement in teaching side, as well extramural educations help in advancement of knowledge and skill. Majority of them disagreed that, in nursing profession there is a lack of dual role, i.e., practicing in both clinical and teaching side.
Furthermore, majority of the faculty strongly agree that there are plenty of opportunities for government job in India and abroad. Majority of them agree that there are less job opportunities in teaching side whereas most of the subject disagree with diminished clinical knowledge after engaging in teaching side.
| Discussion | | |
No single study focused on assessing the perception of nursing faculty toward their preferred profession, as well as no studies were carried out among a wide range of the Indian population. The present study covered subjects from all regions of India. In the present study, almost 2/3rd of the subjects (64.7%) were female faculty. This result is supported by Rekisso et al. who aimed to explore nurses' perceptions toward their profession and associated factors in selected public hospitals among 348 nurses, in which 60.6% (n = 211) of study participants were female nurses.[14] These findings were corroborated with the study conducted by Gerezgiher et.al on the assessment of Nurses knowledge and perceptions toward nursing professions at public hospitals, and he found that more than half (55.5%) of the respondents were females.[15]
In the present study, more than 3/4th of the nursing faculty were (82%) aged ≥30 years and the distribution of level of perception and age had no significant association as evident by P > 0.05 (i.e., 0.196). The study by Gerezgiher et al. and Kathreena et al. revealed that the majority of the subjects were between the ages of 30 and 40, which was consistent with our study findings. Our study's findings were also consistent with Kathreena et al study finding, which revealed that there is a substantial relationship between age and perception of the nursing profession.[14]
In the present study, more than 3/4th of the subjects (78.7%) were married. study findings were similar to Rekisso et.al study showed that 57% of subjects were married and 71% were graduates. The current study focused on nursing faculty working in college of nursing or school of nursing and most of the educational institution in India prefer postgraduates' candidates for the teaching profession. But, the supported studies assessed the perception of clinical nurses towards in their profession.
In the present study most of the subject had more than 6 years of teaching experience and 61% of the faculty had clinical experience also. Similarly, Rekisso et al.'s study showed that 56.6% of participants had 6 to 10 years of professional work experience, 31.3% had < 5 years of work experience, and approximately 12% had more than 10 years of work experience.[14] Similarly, Gerezgiher study showed that, majority of nurses (N = 86) of had more than 10 years of work experience.[15] In the present study, more than half of the subjects (55.5%) were working in the private sector.these findings were contradicted with the findings of the study conducted by Gerezgiher et al. which showed that 86% of the respondent were working in government hospital.
In the present study, the frequency distribution of nursing faculty showed that nearly 62.7% of the subjects (188) had a favorable perception toward their preferred profession and more than 37.3% (112) of them had an unfavorable perception. The present study findings also supported with Belete A's(2015) study about perceptions toward the nursing profession among nursing and nonnursing personnel. His study revealed that 64 (50%) of the respondents showed a favorable perception toward nursing profession and 64 (50%) shown unfavorable perception and majority 4 (63.6%) of the physicians shown unfavorable perception.[17] Similarly, study conducted by Mohanasundari et.al on student nurses showed that 99% subjects had a favourable perception and Kaur et al. study also revealed that 90.83% of the students had positive perception towards nursing profession.[18] The present study finding is also supported by the study finding of Gerezgiher on nurses' perceptions toward the nursing profession. The result showed that out of the 135 nurses, 124 (91.8%) of them had a favorable perception toward the nursing profession.[15] Similarly, Kathreena et al. found that 26 (43.33%) of nursing students had a favorable perception toward the nursing profession, while 34 (56.67%) had a moderately favorable perception.[16] The present study findings contradict those of Rekisso et al. Only 46% of nurses in Addis Ababa city public hospitals had a favorable perception toward their profession.[14] The subjects in the supportive studies were nursing students and nurses. In the present study, the subjects were nursing faculty. That could be the reason for the high difference in the percentage between the present study and a few supportive studies.
In the present study, binary logistic regression analysis revealed that marital status (AOR: 0.100; 95% CI: 0.36, 0.280), qualification (AOR: 2.194; 95% CI: 1.205, 3.993), and clinical experience ((AOR: 2.013; 95% CI: 1.173, 3.454) had a significant influence on the level of perception of nursing faculty toward their preferred profession. These findings were consistent with Rekisso et al. study which revealed that experienced nurses were 1.19 times more likely to have a favourable perception nursing profession than younger age group. (AOR: 1.19; 95% CI: 0.625–13.37).[14]
In the present study, the majority (n = 138) of the nursing faculty showed a favorable perception toward feeling proud of being in this profession. The majority of them (n = 114) showed an unfavorable perception toward the fact that “the pay on the teaching side is not reasonable.” These findings stand in contrast to the results of the study by Rekisso et al. he found that, just 103 (29.4%) of the participants stated that they were proud to be a nurse and that they enjoyed their work, while the remaining 248 (71%) had a negative opinion towards nursing profession. Additionally, 225 (64.7%) of the study participants stated that they intended to leave their career because of the reduced monthly pay. The current study's subjects were nursing faculty, while the contradictory study's subjects were nurses. That could be the reason for differences in the level of perception toward the chosen profession.[14]
Limitations of the study
Not all the participant referred another participant. Great reinforcement was required to make participant to fill out and forward the online based survey link. Since most of the responses were collected through an online mode, there have been a response bias in the data. The response rate in the study was 100%.
| Conclusion | | |
From the above results, it was concluded that the nursing faculties had a favorable perception toward their profession. The factors that influence perception levels are marital status, qualification, and clinical experience. The faculties had a favorable perception toward working conditions, pay, working hours, and the availability of jobs in India as well as around the world. They perceive that conferences, workshops, and seminars help them to keep updated on professional knowledge, and that more opportunities are there to gain knowledge. For most subjects, the teaching profession is preferable for balancing work and family life.
Financial support and sponsorship
Nil.
Conflicts of interest
There are no conflicts of interest.
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| 17. | Belete A, Lamaro T, Henok A. Assessment of Attitudes towards Nursing Profession among Nurses and Non-Nursing HealthProfessionals Working in Mizan-Aman General Hospital, Southwest Ethiopia . J Nurs Care 2015;S1:1-7. |
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[Figure 1]
[Table 1], [Table 2], [Table 3], [Table 4]
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