Flight nurses in Australia: maintaining their midwifery competence - a case study

Area of Science:

• Nursing
• Midwifery
• Aviation Medicine

Background:

• Flight nurses (FNs) in Australia function as sole practitioners, managing diverse patient populations.
• Existing literature lacks information on how FNs maintain midwifery competence.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate how Australian FNs determine their midwifery practice competence.
• To explore the role of continuing professional development (CPD) in maintaining midwifery clinical skills and knowledge for FNs.

Main Methods:

• Data collection via computer-mediated communication.
• Thematic framework analysis of collected data.

Main Results:

• Maintaining midwifery practice competence is challenging for FNs due to infrequent midwifery patient care.
• CPD is recognized as essential for skill maintenance.
• A lack of motivation for CPD was observed, linked to the absence of programs tailored to the unique practice context of FNs.

Conclusions:

• The complexity of maintaining midwifery skills for Australian FNs necessitates tailored CPD.
• Developing specialized CPD programs is crucial to address the unique scope and context of flight nursing midwifery practice.