Developing a comprehensive career development scale for public health nurses in Japan

Area of Science:

• Nursing Science
• Public Health
• Career Development Studies

Background:

• Public health nurses (PHNs) play a crucial role in community health.
• Assessing and fostering the career development of PHNs is essential for effective public health services.
• Existing tools may not comprehensively capture the multifaceted aspects of PHN career progression.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate a comprehensive scale for measuring the career development of public health nurses (PHNs).
• To provide a reliable instrument for assessing key factors influencing PHN career growth.
• To establish a foundation for enhancing PHN education and professional identity.

Main Methods:

• Cross-sectional study involving 1,009 PHNs in Japan.
• Development of a 32-item scale measuring career development.
• Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were used to establish construct validity.
• Reliability was assessed using Cronbach's alpha; validity was examined using external references and the known-group method.

Main Results:

• The developed scale comprises 32 items across three factors: community activities, policy, and management; PHN identity; and foundations as a PHN.
• The scale demonstrated high reliability with Cronbach's alpha coefficients exceeding 0.9 for all factors.
• Confirmatory factor analysis confirmed acceptable goodness of fit, supporting the scale's construct validity.

Conclusions:

• The newly developed comprehensive career development scale for PHNs is reliable and valid.
• This scale can be utilized to enhance PHN identity and competency in both basic and in-service education.
• The findings support the use of this scale for professional development initiatives within the public health nursing field.