Nursing education: focus on flexibility

Curricular change requires input from both service and education. However, it is sometimes difficult to obtain a complete picture of nursing practice from the clinical arena. The curriculum committee of the University of San Diego Philip Y. Hahn School of Nursing conducted a study with focus groups comprised of nurses from several different areas of practice to obtain information for curriculum changes. Both the focus group process and its outcomes are reported here. Flexibility was the key theme that emerged from all of the focus group sessions. Other themes were categorized in terms of issues addressed and included professional issues, healthcare systems issues, nursing education issues, and advanced practice issues. The focus group strategy proved to be an effective means of gaining the broad spectrum of insights needed for curriculum revision.