Nurses must have a personal knowledge of the experiences and needs of the patients. To do this, nurses should create care environments that promote an exchange of experiences and knowledge between the nurse and the patient and family.
Aim
To explore experiences of frontline nurse managers during COVID‐19.
Background
The COVID‐19 pandemic has complicated care provision and healthcare management around the world. Nurse managers have had to face the challenge of managing a crisis with precarious resources. Little research has been published about the experiences of nurse managers during the COVID‐19 pandemic.
Methods
A qualitative descriptive study of 10 frontline nurse managers at a highly specialized university hospital in Spain was carried out. Semi‐structured interviews were conducted between June and September 2020. The Consolidated Criteria for Reporting Qualitative Research checklist was used for reporting.
Results
Six themes emerged: constant adaptation to change, participation in decision‐making, management of uncertainty, prioritization of the biopsychosocial well‐being of the staff, preservation of humanized care and ‘one for all’.
Conclusions
This study provides evidence for the experiences of nurse managers during the COVID‐19 pandemic. In addition, analysing these experiences has helped identify some of the key competencies that these nurses must have to respond to a crisis and in their dual role as patient and nurse mediators.
Implications for Nursing Management
Knowing about the experiences of frontline nurse managers during the pandemic can facilitate planning and preparing nurse managers for future health disasters, including subsequent waves of COVID‐19.
The rapid introduction of IT systems for clinical practice urges evaluation of already implemented systems examining how and in what circumstances they work to guide effective further development and implementation of IT systems to enhance clinical practice. Evaluation involves more factors than just involving technologies such as changing attitudes, cultures and healthcare practices. Realistic evaluation could provide configurations of context-mechanism-outcomes that explain the underlying relationships to understand why and how a programme or intervention works.
This paper is a literature review of the clinical nurse manager role. The purpose is to identify, in today's health care environment, what expectations organizations in this role have, and therefore to determine the skills and characteristics required to be effective at this level. An analysis of the literature revealed a consensus that human and leadership skills are taking the place of clinical skills. It is suggested that within them decision-making is the key factor in responding to the changing and competitive health care environment.
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