Nursing students' confidence in medication calculations predicts math exam performance

Area of Science:

• Nursing Education
• Psychometrics
• Healthcare Professional Training

Background:

• Accurate medication calculation is vital for patient safety in nursing.
• Assessing nursing students' mathematical self-efficacy is crucial for identifying learning needs.
• Existing tools may not adequately capture the specific mathematical competencies required for nursing practice.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the psychometric properties and predictive validity of the newly developed Nursing Self-Efficacy for Mathematics (NSE-Math) scale.
• To determine if the NSE-Math scale can predict nursing students' performance on medication calculation examinations.
• To establish the NSE-Math as a reliable and valid instrument for measuring mathematics self-efficacy in nursing students.

Main Methods:

• The 12-item NSE-Math scale was administered to second-year Bachelor of Nursing students.
• Student academic results from a compulsory medication calculation examination were collected.
• Factor analysis and reliability testing (Cronbach's alpha) were performed on the NSE-Math scale.

Main Results:

• The NSE-Math scale demonstrated a two-factor structure: 'Confidence in application of mathematic concepts to nursing practice' and 'Confidence in arithmetic concepts', explaining 63.5% of the variance.
• The scale exhibited high internal consistency, with a Cronbach's alpha of 0.90.
• The NSE-Math scale showed significant predictive validity for medication calculation examination results (p=0.009).

Conclusions:

• The NSE-Math scale is a psychometrically sound instrument for assessing mathematics self-efficacy in nursing students.
• The NSE-Math scale effectively predicts nursing students' ability to perform medication calculations.
• This validated tool can aid educators in identifying and supporting students with lower mathematics self-efficacy, ultimately improving medication safety.