Stories of yesterday. Reflections on collegiality: Capturing the essence of nurses working with nurses

BACKGROUND This research aimed to answer the question, ‘what are long-serving nurses’ experiences of collegiality: nurses working with nurses?’ It involved gathering nurses’ stories about their experiences of practicing nursing and, in particular, their experiences of collegiality, within the context of hospital nursing in New Zealand in the 1970s and 1980s. METHOD The research is a qualitative approach based on oral history; gathering historical stories through focus group interviews which provided the opportunity for participants to share their stories regarding collegial moments within nursing in a narrative form. The participants in the research were registered and enrolled nurses who had been working in general medical/surgical wards within the District Health Board (DHB) environment for two to three decades. Two focus groups involving a total of 10 nurses were held in two different DHB regions within New Zealand. The nurses were all known to the researcher and volunteered to participate. RESULTS The narrative data was analysed following Annells and Whitehead (2007) process referred to as ‘fracturing, grouping and gluing’, a style of qualitative data analysis that allows data to be categorised according to themes. Five key themes of discussion emerged from the collected data: stories from the nurses’ home, the concept of sharing the bottom rung in a hierarchy, stories of humour on the ward, stories of shared experiences and a theme predominantly discussing perceptions of change. CONCLUSION The experiences of collegiality through nurses working with nurses, was indicative of fun, humour, shared experiences and camaraderie, in an environment that was busy, demanding and often challenging. Collegiality became an important aspect of not just surviving, but thriving. This is evidenced in the richness of the nostalgia that was apparent as the research participants sat together and reminisced about these times. The outcomes of this research will add to our understanding of nursing history in New Zealand and past experiences of collegiality within the nursing profession.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Nursing

Level thesis:degree_level

Masters

Grantor

Eastern Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2013

Author dc:creator

• Stewart, Joce

• New Zealand
• nurses
• collegialty
• experience
• stories
• history
• interviews

Statement dc:rights

• All rights reserved

Language dc:language.iso

en

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/10652/6464

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:null:10652/6464