Developing nurse match: A selection tool for evoking and scoring an applicant's nursing values and attributes

Area of Science:

• Nursing Education
• Healthcare Professional Assessment
• Values-Based Recruitment

Background:

• Assessing nursing values is crucial for effective healthcare delivery.
• Existing methods may lack standardization or efficiency in evaluating candidate values.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate the Nurse Match (NM) instrument for assessing nursing values.
• To evaluate the instrument's ability to score candidate values against professionally preferred standards.
• To determine the instrument's effectiveness and efficiency in candidate screening.

Main Methods:

• A qualitative, case study-based process with quantified output was employed.
• The instrument uses bi-polar value dimensions to assess self-perception and perception by others.
• Sixty-three first-year nursing students completed the instrument and a feedback questionnaire.

Main Results:

• The NM instrument effectively discriminated between nursing students based on professional values.
• It generated reliable suitability scores (S^TOT scores) that approximated normal distributions.
• The instrument was found to be valid, reliable, user-friendly, and well-received by participants.

Conclusions:

• The NM instrument provides a standardized, effective, and user-friendly screening process for nursing values and attributes.
• It serves as a valuable complement to other assessment methods.
• Further development with actual applicants is suggested to refine its application.