Advanced Search

Journal Navigation

Journal Home

Subscriptions

Archive

Contact Us

Table of Contents

Click here to sign up for SAGE Journal Email Alerts today!

Sign In to gain access to subscriptions and/or personal tools.
Western Journal of Nursing Research
This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow References
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to Saved Citations
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Right arrow Request Reprints
Right arrow Add to My Marked Citations
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Right arrow Citing Articles via Scopus
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Bjørk, I. T.
Right arrow Articles by Romyn, D. M.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Bjørk, I. T.
Right arrow Articles by Romyn, D. M.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Complore   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us   Add to Digg   Add to Reddit   Add to Technorati   Add to Twitter  
What's this?

What Constitutes a Nursing Practical Skill?

Ida Torunn Bjørk

Institute of Nursing Science, University of Oslo, Norway

Donna M. Romyn, R.N., Ph.D.

University of Alberta

Practical nursing skills ensure patients’physical comfort, hygiene, and safe medical treatment. The learning, performance, or significance of nursing practical skills are seldom a theme in theoretical and philosophical debate or the topic of research within nursing. This might be due to a long-standing behavioristic tradition in nursing of viewing nursing practical skills in a simplistic way, only as correctly sequenced motor movement. The purpose of this article is to bring forth an argument for a broader understanding of the constitution of nursing practical skills. This argument is substantiated by a review of past and present conceptualizations of nursing practical skills as well as by philosophical reflections on the value of practical skills in the nursing profession. Nursing practical skills embrace dimensions of performance, intention, and nursing "disciplined" understanding.

Western Journal of Nursing Research, Vol. 21, No. 1, 51-63 (1999)
DOI: 10.1177/01939459922043703
Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Complore Complore   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to Technorati Technorati   Add to Twitter Twitter    What's this?