The educational needs of non-specialist breast care nurses

Aims. To provide an indicative occupational profile and identify the educational needs of non-specialist nurses working with breast cancer patients. Design. A postal questionnaire survey, using a modified, but psychometrically validated, training needs analysis instrument. Setting. The acute and community sectors of three large trusts. Participants. 119 general nurses working with breast cancer patients. Findings. Significant educational needs were identified for all 30 items of the questionnaire, thereby indicating that participants had both general and cancer-specific training needs. However, 13 of the 14 cancer-related items were among the top 19 training needs, suggesting that these should be a priority focus for targeted educational programmes. No differences were found between acute and community nurses, although D grade (newly qualified) nurses had significantly greater educational needs than E grade nurses (with around 2 years’ experience post-qualifying). The indicative occupational profile suggested that the most important tasks were perceived to be communication/team-work, self-management, awareness of special psycho-social problems, knowledge of specific clinical issues, and management of the care package; the least relevant tasks were seen to be specific health promotion activities, supervision, using technical equipment and research/audit. Conclusion. This sample of general nurses working with breast cancer patients reported both general and specific educational needs. The information yielded by the current survey could be used to inform continuing educational development for this group, and in this way, could inform the content and mode of delivery of its provision. Continuing professional development (CPD) courses which are based on empirical studies of workforce educational needs could rationalise resources and ultimately enhance patient care. The indicative occupational profile could be used as a competency indicator and might also inform CPD provision.