Effects of a short-term linguistic class on communication competence of international nurses: Implications for practice, policy, and research

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

1-2012

Publication Title

Nursing Economics

Volume

30

Issue

1

First page number:

21

Last page number:

28

Abstract

International nurses face a host of challenges in their transition and adaptation to the U.S. health care environment. Language and communication barriers have been ranked consistently as a top concern by employers, regulatory agencies, and international nurses themselves. Researchers in this study examined the effects of a 10-week linguistic class on the reduction of phonologic errors affecting foreign accent in a sample of international nurses. The linguistic course appeared to be effective in improving the international nurses' linguistic competence by reducing their phonologic errors significantly. Moreover, the intervention narrowed the linguistic gap between international nurses from non-English and English-speaking countries. Findings from this study have important implications for practice, policy, and research regarding quality of care, as well as for the transition, job satisfaction, and retention of international nurses.

Keywords

Analysis of variance; Communication -- Study & teaching; Communication barriers; Communication in nursing; Communicative competence; English language — Study and teaching — Foreign speakers; Foreign; Linguistics; Nonparametric statistics; Nurses; Nurses; Foreign -- Education; Nursing; Pilot projects; Pre-tests & post-tests; Research -- Finance; Research -- Methodology; Sample size (Statistics); Sampling (Statistics); Scales (Weighing instruments); Statistics

Disciplines

Economics | Health Communication | Health Economics | International and Intercultural Communication | Interpersonal and Small Group Communication | Nursing | Other Nursing

Language

English

Permissions

Use Find in Your Library, contact the author, or use interlibrary loan to garner a copy of the article. Publisher copyright policy allows author to archive post-print (author’s final manuscript). When post-print is available or publisher policy changes, the article will be deposited


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