Assessment of the Effect of Continuing Education Program on Nurse’s Knowledge, Attitude and Performance about Documentation

Background: Documentation is one of the nurses’ professional tasks, which is an important component of medical evidence and patient’s record. Finding effective teaching methods for enhancing nurses’ ability in documentation can be helpful. Aim: This study was performed to determine the effect of continuing education program on nurse’s knowledge, attitude and performance about documentation. Method: A quasi-experimental before and after design was carried out on 62 nurses who were working at a public  hospitals in Kerman and were randomly allocated to two experimental (n = 32) and control groups (n = 30). Data collection tools were a self-structured questionnaire as well as tools for measurement of knowledge, attitude, performance, and competency of subjects regarding nursing documentation, which were completed before and after implementing a continuing education program. Data were analyzed using Chi-Square, paired t- tests and independent t- tests with SPSS version 14. Results: There were significant differences between nurses who participated in the intervention and control groups in terms of knowledge (P =0.000), attitude (P=0.000), performance (P=0 .001) and competency (P=0 .000) towards documentation. The findings showed that there was no statistically significant difference between two groups in relation to demographic variables. Conclusion: The results of this study suggest that continuing education program promote knowledge, attitude, performance and competency of nurses on documentation. It is recommended to accomplish more studies about learning stability following employing this method and its comparison with other educational methods.