Aims and objectives: To evaluate the impact of a partnership learning programme designed to support undergraduate nursing students' competence in speaking with patients about spiritual issues.
Background: Spiritual care is an oft-neglected and underexposed area of nursing practice. Despite the increasing amount of research on spiritual care in educational programmes, little is known about nursing students' experiences with existential/spiritual talks and the process of learning about spiritual care in the clinical placement.
Design: The project used a qualitative evaluation design to evaluate the impact of a partnership-initiated intervention focusing on student learning of spiritual care in a hospital ward.
Methods: Data were collected through three focus group interviews with bachelor of nursing students from one Norwegian university college and supplemented with notes. Data were analysed by means of qualitative interpretative content analysis.
Results: The intervention was found to enhance students' competence in spiritual talks. The students developed an extended understanding of spirituality, became more confident in speaking with patients about spiritual issues and more active in grasping opportunities to provide spiritual care. Participating nurses significantly contributed to the students' learning process by being role models, mentoring the students and challenging them to overcome barriers in speaking with patients about spiritual issues.
Conclusions: The partnership learning programme proved to be a useful model in terms of enhancing students' confidence in speaking with patients about spiritual concerns.
Relevance to clinical practice: Collaboration between nursing university colleges and clinical placements could help nursing students and clinical nurses to develop competencies in spiritual care and bridge the gap between academic education and clinical education, to the benefit of both.
Keywords: nurse education; qualitative study; reflection; spirituality.
© 2016 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.