Master universitario in Area Neonatologica e Pediatrica per infermieri: risultati di uno studio Delphi italiano

Introduction Paediatric nurse has the competencies to respond to the health needs of patients with an age range between 23 weeks of gestation to 18 years. Health needs of developmental age have changed and new priorities that require specific care competencies have came out. In addition, the limited number of places for the Paediatric Nursing Degree combined with hospitals’ organizational reasons, force to leave neonatal and paediatric care to generalist nurses. The aim of this work is to identify the skills of clinical nurse specialist in the Neonatology and Pediatric Area and delineate the study plan of the first level Master in Neonatology and Pediatric Area.Methods The Delphi method were used for the survey. The panel was set up including all Directors / Coordinators of Paediatric Nursing Degree in Italy during the academic year of 2018/19. Two rounds were performed: in the first one, the experts indicated the specialist skills of the paediatric nurse; while in the second round they expressed level of agreement about the structure of the study plan.Results The panel was composed of 10 experts from all the 9 Italian paediatric nursing schools. 9/10 experts responded to both rounds. The first round highlighted 131 specialist competencies. In the second round, the levels of agreement reached about 131 synthetic statements were high for 92 of them, average for 33 and weak for the last 6 statements.Conclusions The curriculum developed with the Delphi method is the result of highly experienced nurses’ opinion. Further studies could be very useful to evaluate the validity of this study plan.