Aim: The aim is to illustrate and analyse reflections from graduate nursing students over their experience of discussing racism in healthcare in an educational intervention.
Design: A qualitative, descriptive design was adopted.
Methods: Data were collected through written reflections and analysed through content analysis. In total, 81 students participated in the intervention; 39 paediatric and 42 public health care nursing students. Of those, 27 participants gave consent to have their written reflections included in the study.
Results: Three main categories were developed in the content analysis of student reflections: (a) the implicit embeddedness of racism in healthcare organization; (b) the effect of racism on interactions with patients; and (c) a growing awareness of one's own understanding of racism. This study indicates that student nurses discussed racism as relevant to understanding good clinical practice for the benefit of patients and work-based wellbeing of staff. This recognition of the organizational nature of racism warrants nursing leaders and managers to include racism as a social determinant of health in the undergraduate and graduate curricula to educate the next generation of nursing about racism.
Keywords: graduate nursing education; healthcare; knowledge; nurse; qualitative study; racism.
© 2023 The Authors. Nursing Open published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.