title: Skilled nursing practice -- a qualitative study of the elements of nursing.
abstract: An understanding of skilled nursing practice has implications for the identity of nursing in service delivery, and for the learning environment of the developing nurse. Here I report a qualitative study, largely reliant on ethnography, which became a journey of exploration through accounts and descriptions given by nurses in a number of different practice settings. This journey is founded in an understanding of what I have called a phenomenological and psychosocial tradition, recognising the importance of a postmodern influence, which is in tension with a scientific and behavioural tradition. The emergence of four domains of skilled nursing practice in a contextualised narrative would seem to offer justification of assumptions concerning the value of embedded knowledge and intuitive clinical judgement in nursing practice, and lay a foundation for a qualitative study of the developing nurse.
authors.affiliation: Clinical Nurse Specialist, Psychotherapy Department, Southern Derbyshire Mental Health Trust, Temple House, Mill Hill Lane, Derby DE23 6PF, UK. bulls77@aol.com
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Buller
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Butterworth
mesh_terms: D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D000884:Anthropology, Cultural; D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D002983:Clinical Competence / Q000592:standards*; D003142:Communication; D006801:Humans; D007587:Job Description; D016294:Models, Nursing; D009726:Nurses / Q000523:psychology*; D009732:Nursing Care / Q000458:organization & administration* / Q000523:psychology; D015404:Nursing Methodology Research; D015279:Organizational Culture; D010687:Philosophy, Nursing; D012107:Research Design; D012649:Self Concept; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D017748:Time Management