Investigation of a Southeastern community's knowledge and intent to use a nurse practitioner

The concept of the advanced practice nurse was first conceived in the 1960s in an effort to provide patients with adequate primary health care. Changes in the health care delivery system since that time have facilitated this role. The past ten years has seen an increasing number of physicians utilizing nurse practitioners (NPs) in their practices.As physicians consider this alternative, they are interested in knowing how their patients will accept this change.Review of the literature regarding the health care consumer's acceptance of the NP as a health care provider revealed that the majority of the research, thus far, has been accomplished with the medically underserved populations. The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between consumer knowledge and intention to use a NP in an urban community that is not medically underserved.Imogene King's theory of goal attainment was used to guide the study. King desribes her theory as being the only one to deal with choices, alternatives and participation of all individuals in making decisions about their health care.While visiting three local businesses in May, the participants filled out a researcher-generated questionnaire that assessed their knowledge and intention of using a NP. Thirty-six percent answered yes to all nine knowledge questions with 42% indicating they would be willing to use a NP for all nine inquiries. Pearson correlation coefficient was utilized to determine that there was a significant positive relationship between knowledge of the role of the NP and intent to use one as a health care provider. The conclusion was reached that as knowledge of the role of the NP increases so does intent to use one.The data also revealed a knowledge deficit regarding the role of the NP among this population.

Grantor dc:publisher

University of Tennessee at Chattanooga

Author dc:creator

• Park, Elizabeth Ann

Contributors dc:contributor

• Anderson, Barbara K.
• Holder, Pam; Ch'ien, Anne
• College of Health, Education, and Professional Studies

• Nurse practitioners--Public opinion
• Primary care (Medicine)
• Health planning--Citizen participation

Licence

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Language dc:language

English, eng

Identifier

LB2369.2 .P374 1998

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:scholar.utc.edu:theses-2107