Introduction: The effectiveness of a student's clinical training depends on several factors, including his/her previous theoretical preparation, prejudice and anxiety, as well as the social atmosphere in the medical department and the acceptance by the health care team. Educational and clinical tutors play an important supportive role by helping students to cope with difficult situations, such as violent behavior by mentally disordered patients. Purpose: The purpose of this thesis was to explore the attitude of health care students prior to, during and after their clinical training in psychiatric nursing. Methods: The research was based on a descriptive quantitative method and a survey which involved nursing students from the Faculty of Health Sciences, Ljubljana, who had already completed clinical training in psychiatry. The survey was carried by using the 1KA and EnKlikAnketa online tools and the questionnaires were collected between March and May of 2017. The data obtained through a questionnaire were processed by the IBM SPSS Statistic 22 computer software. Results: Out of 98 nursing students who participated in the survey, 51 % stated that they had not possessed sufficient theoretical knowledge at the start of their clinical training, 86.7 % felt accepted by their health care teams and 73.5 % assessed the working atmosphere in the department as very good. 48 % of the students experienced anxiety before their clinical training; in 20.4 % of cases this anxiety dissappeared during or after the training, and in 24.5 percent of cases it decreased. 70.4 % of the students denied having any prejudices against mentally disordered patients before the training. During the training 15.3 % of the students experienced some form of violence by the patients. Discussion and conclusion: Our survey – along with others carried out abroad – has reaffirmed the great importance of theoretical preparation in nursing students prior to any clinical training. The survey also reaffirmed the importance of the support of educational and clinical mentors in the case of stressful situations during clinical training, such as the patients' violent behavior. This subject requires further research.
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