Adoption of innovations by specialised nurses: personal, work and organisational characteristics.
BACKGROUND
To gain insight in the factors that influence the adoption of professional information by specialised nurses, we studied the effects of individual, work and organisational characteristics on the extent to which continence nurses gained knowledge and made use of a book on nursing diagnosis and interventions for patients with urinary incontinence, which they received as a present.


METHODS
Subjects were all members of the Dutch Association of Continence Nurses. Data collection took place via a postal questionnaire with closed questions. In total, 109 valid questionnaires (78%) were received back. Stepwise selected ordered logit models were estimated with reading the book and knowledge and use of five selected parts of it as dependent variables and individual, work and organisational characteristics as independent variables.


RESULTS
The most important factors found to promote reading of the book and taking knowledge of the parts of it were a personal characteristic of the nurses called "information directedness" (or eagerness to acquire professional information from other sources), the presence of an "innovative atmosphere" at the department, and "relevance" of the information for daily nursing practice. The most important factors found to promote the use of the book are (again) information directedness, working at a (relatively) small department and having experience with nursing diagnosis.


CONCLUSIONS
Results suggest that nurses differ in the degree to which they are open to innovations and that information directedness might be a useful indicator of this characteristic. In addition, the degree of innovativeness of the atmosphere at the department and the relevance of the innovation for nursing practice are important factors influencing the success or failure of innovations in nursing practice.
van der Weide
Marian
M
Departments of Urology and Nursing Science, University Medical Centre St. Radboud, Secretariat CSS/2 970, P.O. Box 9101, 6500 HB Nijmegen, The Netherlands. m.vanderweide@css2bb.umcn.nl
Smits
Jeroen
J
D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D002983:Clinical Competence / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D004059:Diffusion of Innovation; D005260:Female; D005851:Geriatric Nursing / Q000193:education / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000592:standards*; D019983:Guideline Adherence / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009426:Netherlands; D009733:Nursing Diagnosis / Q000592:standards; D012014:Reference Books, Medical; D012956:Societies, Nursing; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013647:Task Performance and Analysis; D014549:Urinary Incontinence / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000451:nursing*