The Effect of Mindfulness Program on Clinical Stress, Clinical Decision Making and Personality Traits in Nursing

Nurses are important members of the team in the provision of health services, which determine and help the health needs of the individual, family and society, while working towards the protection and development of health, as well as taking responsibility in therapeutic services. Nurses, who are permanent members of the professional health team, need to be trained with certain skills for effective nursing care while they are still in the education process. These skills are essential skills in practice, such as critical thinking, clinical decision making, communication, creativity, coping with stress, and problem solving. The education process consists of two parts, theoretical and practical, in order to develop these skills. Clinical practical training is the cornerstone of nursing education.

Clinical practice helps to provide effective and quality care by increasing the psycho-motor skills, analysis ability and clinical decision-making skills of the student. In studies conducted with nursing students, it is seen that clinical practices are among the most important sources of stress.

Considering the reasons for the stress they experience in practice; practice for the first time, fear of making mistakes, harming the patient, difficulty in making clinical decisions, communication with nurses, lecturers and friends, lack of information, and self-confidence problems.

It is seen in the results of studies that students who experience stress in clinical practice have difficulty in decision making, decrease in their performance and self-confidence, decrease in professional career motivation, and a high tendency to make medical mistakes. Strategies for coping with stress are important when experiencing and managing stress. There are two types of coping strategies: problem-based and emotion-based. While problem-based coping aims to change the stressful event, the aim of emotion-based coping is to suppress and manage the emotions related to the stressful event. Stress mechanism and levels do not show effective results through problem-based coping alone. Emotion-based coping processes are also important. Orientation programs, simulation trainings, and laboratory practices with nursing students focus only on the knowledge level of clinical stress.There is also a need for studies on the emotional aspect of stress in the application areas. Being able to cope with stress effectively is important for students to benefit from the theoretical and clinical education they receive in a quality manner, to create a good experience and professional identity, and to develop effective coping behaviors.