Efficacy of English Language Programs as Judged by Nurses and Students of Nursing: Do Nurses in Iran Need to Know English?

Nurses among other medical professions are expected and need to communicate in English. The present study will report the views of nurses and students of nursing on the efficacy of English programs at Iranian medical universities in three major areas: general usage, medical usage, and research usage. This descriptive study included 130 students of nursing and 167 nurses selected through randomized clustering sampling. It was conducted in Sabzevar, Iran. They were asked to fill out a questionnaire including demographic information and 31 Likert questions on the effectiveness of ELT programs in medical universities. The participants judged the efficacy of EFL instruction in the General English section to be 25.7306±8.29288 (out of 50), the Medical English to be 21.1434± 7.40024 (out of 45), and the Research usage to be 24.6496±11.56735 (out of 60), showing a wide gap. However, the effectiveness of the current ELT programs was not so differently judged by male and female participants. Males considered the Research usage to be more affected by the current programs but females did not think so; however, the difference of views was not statistically significant (P=0.019). In general, the results indicated a wide gap between the judgment of nurses and students of nursing about the efficacy of the ELT programs in Iranian medical universities. Therefore, a change is needed to cater for the expectations from the nursing job as far as the English language is concerned as a means of communication in the world today.