Kristina Mikkonen

• Doctor of Nursing Science
• Professor at University of Oulu

Background: Previously, it has been shown that the clinical learning environment causes challenges for international nursing students, but there is a lack of empirical evidence relating to the background factors explaining and influencing the outcomes. Objective: To describe international and national students' perceptions of their clinical lear...

Aim: The purpose of this study was to develop and test the psychometric properties of the new Cultural and Linguistic Diversity scale, which is designed to be used with the newly validated Clinical Learning Environment, Supervision and Nurse Teacher scale for assessing international nursing students' clinical learning environments. Background: I...

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0020748915001984 Learning in the clinical environment of healthcare students plays a significant part in higher education. The greatest challenges for culturally and linguistically diverse healthcare students were found in clinical placements, where differences in language and culture have been show...

Background: Globalisation has brought new possibilities for international growth in education and professional mobility among healthcare professionals. There has been a noticeable increase of international degree programmes in non-English speaking countries in Europe, creating clinical learning challenges for healthcare students. Objective: The...

The purpose of this study was to describe nursing students' experiences of empathy of nursing teachers with the emphasis on how experiencing empathy from their teachers influences students, their learning and professional development. This research was a qualitative descriptive study conducted through face-to-face interviews with nursing students....

Aim To describe and compare the Evidence‐Based HealthCare (EBHC) competence of Advanced Practice Nurses (APNs), and the factors associated with it in Finland and Singapore. Design A descriptive and analytical cross‐sectional study. Methods Data were collected from APNs working in healthcare in Finland (n = 157) or Singapore (n = 99) between May 2...

Aim To develop and test a Family and Community Nursing—Advanced Practice Scale. Design A cross‐sectional and methodological scale validation design, following classical test theory. Methods Three phases, the first of which involved scale development, including item generation. Phase two assessed the content validity index. The third phase involve...

Tutkimuksen tarkoituksena oli kuvata hoitotyön lähiesihenkilöiden kokemuksia tunneälyjohtamisesta sosiaali- ja terveysalan monikulttuurisissa työyhteisöissä. Aineisto kerättiin teemahaastatteluilla hoitotyön lähiesihenkilöiltä (n=14). Aineisto kerättiin loka-joulukuussa 2021 kahdesta julkisesta ja yhdestä yksityisestä sosiaali- ja terveysalan organ...

Sosiaali- ja terveydenhuollon palvelujen ja rakenteen uudistus pyrkii rajoittamaan kustannusten kasvua ja edistämään palveluihin pääsyä. Sosiaali- ja terveydenhuollon palveluita kehitetään yhä asiakaslähtöisimmiksi, oikea-aikaisimmiksi, vaikuttavammiksi ja tehokkaammiksi digitalisaatiota hyödyntäen. Muutokset vaikuttavat etenkin terveydenhuollon ty...

Aim The current study aimed to identify digital health literacy levels among nurses with respect to their education, role and attitude towards digital technologies. Design Cross‐sectional study. Methods Through convenience sampling, all Registered Nurses, managers/leaders and nurse researchers employed in Hospitals, University Hospitals and Distr...

Aims To profile the characteristics of nurses with varying levels of vaccine hesitancy toward the COVID‐19 and influenza vaccines. Background In many countries across the world, healthcare workers, and nurses in particular, display significant reluctance toward COVID‐19 and influenza vaccines due to concerns about safety, distrust in healthcare po...

Introduction: Vaccine hesitancy is a complex issue of global concern. As nurses play a vital role in delivering patient care and shaping public opinions on vaccines, interventions to address vaccine hesitancy in nursing are imperative. As such, identifying profiles of characteristics and attitudes contributing to hesitancy may help identify specif...

Aim To synthesize evidence on healthcare professionals' experiences of competencies in mentoring undergraduate healthcare, social care and medical students during their interprofessional clinical practice. Design This review was conducted by the JBI methodology for systematic reviews of qualitative evidence. Methods Studies were included if they...

Background. New evidence on the digital competencies of healthcare leaders can provide essential knowledge for building training for the leaders to ensure high-quality patient care. Objective. The aim of this mixed-methods systematic review was to identify the current best evidence from qualitative, quantitative, and mixed-methods studies on health...

Background. Global nursing shortages have led to the recruitment of culturally and linguistically diverse nurses from various countries. However, nurses face integration challenges in their host countries. Objective. This systematic review aimed to find the most recent evidence of factors associated with integrational strategies and models to suppo...

Health science teacher candidates should acquire skills for professional development during their education as teachers, both to ensure their professional competence and improve the quality of learning. This study aimed to identify the competence levels and competence development needs of health science teacher candidates, and the factors associate...

The study’s purpose was to describe the competence in well-being at work of social and health care educators and the factors influencing it. Cross-sectional study. Data were collected using a questionnaire from social and health care educators (n=243) working at ten randomly selected educational organizations. K-means clustering was used to identif...

Aim The purpose of the study was to describe social and healthcare educators' evidence‐based healthcare competence and explore the associated factors. Design A descriptive, cross‐sectional study was carried out. Methods The research spanned 5 universities, 19 universities of applied sciences, and 10 vocational colleges in Finland from September t...

Healthcare education needs to be reformed to sustain quality, faster response to crises and ensure a rapid and efficient graduation path for future healthcare professionals. In this study, our multidisciplinary team has developed and tested a Human-centred extended reality (XR) to solve challenges in healthcare by connecting humans to technology in...

The recent shift from face-to-face learning to distance learning has affected students’ well-being, which could impact commitment to studies and lead to delays or interruptions. The aim of this study was to describe health science students’ experiences of well-being during the distance learning and social isolation resulting from the COVID-19 pande...

Aims: To describe healthcare professionals' self-assessed competence in stroke care pathways based on their self-evaluation and identify the factors associated with competence. Design: A cross-sectional, descriptive explorative study design was used. Methods: The data were collected during May and September 2021 through a survey sent to healthcare...

Background Given nurses’ increasing international mobility, Asian internationally educated nurses (IENs) represent a critical human resource highly sought after within the global healthcare workforce. Developed countries have grown excessively reliant on them, leading to heightened competition among these countries. Hence, this review aims to uncov...

Background Evidence‐based healthcare (EBHC) enables consistent and effective healthcare that prioritises patient safety. The competencies of advanced practice nurses (APNs) are essential for implementing EBHC because their professional duties include promoting EBHC. Aim To identify, critically appraise, and synthesise the best available evidence c...

Background Socially assistive robots offer an alternate source of connection for interventions within health and social care amidst a landscape of technological advancement and reduced staff capacity. There is a need to summarise the available systematic reviews on the health and wellbeing impacts to evaluate effectiveness, explore potential modera...

There is a clear need for highly competent health sciences experts. No instrument currently exists for assessing the generic competences of health sciences students. The aim of this study is to develop and psychometrically test the Health sciences Generic Competence (HealthGenericCom) instrument. The instrument development four step process has bee...

Aims To identify healthcare professionals' digital health competence profiles and explore associated factors to digital health competence in healthcare settings. Design A cross‐sectional study. Methods Data were collected from 817 healthcare professionals from nine organizations with an electronic questionnaire by using Digital Health Competence...

Background: Many countries are becoming increasingly culturally and linguistically diverse due to globalisation and migration. The global shortage of nurses and the consequent migration of nursing professionals is leading to increasing cultural and linguistic diversity in health care and nursing education. Nurse educators play a significant role in...

Aim To identify evidence on frontline nurse leaders' competences in evidence‐based healthcare (EBHC) and the instruments measuring these competences. Design A scoping review. Data Sources The search was conducted in June 2021 and complemented in June 2022. The CINAHL, ProQuest, Medline (Ovid), Scopus, Web of Science databases and MedNar along wit...

Aim: To describe healthcare professionals’ experience of needed competence in patient stroke care within specialist and primary healthcare. Background: Healthcare professionals who provide stroke care need multifaceted, multi-professional skills; ongoing training is important for competent stroke care. Design: A descriptive qualitative study....

Abstract Background: Educators in the social and health care and health sciences fields play a key role in developing the competencies of health professionals and experts. The increase in hybrid education in higher education provides flexible education but also causes additional stress for educators. In order to develop educators' competencies in h...

This study focuses on collegiality competence among social and healthcare educators, aiming to identify profiles and factors linked to these profiles. The importance of collegiality for educators' career growth and workplace well-being has been recognized, but less attention has been given to specific profiles and their underlying factors. Data fro...

Background Highly competent health care experts are needed for the development of the social and health care sectors. More knowledge is needed on the levels of generic competencies that health sciences experts possess, particularly in the context of complex decision-making. Objectives To describe self-evaluated generic competence of health science...

Chapter deals with new digital learning environments (in Finnish)

This chapter describes new digital environments like e.g hybrid learning, simulation and virtual reality

School exhaustion among upper secondary school students has increased at an alarming rate in recent years. There is evidence that this exhaustion affects students’ ability to study, and that students experience their studies as burdensome. Distance learning has further weakened students’ ability to study. This study aimed to describe upper secondar...

Aims To explore registered nurses' cultural orientation competence profiles for providing culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) nurses with orientation in the hospital setting, and to identify which factors are associated with cultural orientation competence profiles. Design A descriptive, explorative cross‐sectional study. Methods Data we...

Aim: To describe nurse leaders' experiences of how culturally and linguistically diverse registered nurses integrate into healthcare settings. Design: A qualitative descriptive study design. Participants: A total of 13 nurse leaders were recruited from four primary and specialized healthcare organizations in Finland. Methods: Data were colle...

Background Health sciences education prepares students for social‐ and healthcare by developing evidence‐based nursing, leadership and working life skills, including collaboration. Due to the changes caused by the global pandemic, health sciences education has shifted more to online and hybrid contexts, which can challenge students' competence deve...

Aim(s): To describe nurse leaders' perceptions of culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) nurses' competence-based management. Design: A descriptive qualitative study of the competence-based management of CALD nurses, from the perspectives of nurse leaders in three primary and specialised medical care organisations. This study followed the...

Aim: To consider how more use could be made of experimental research in nursing and midwifery education. Background: Much use has been made in nursing and midwifery educational research of pre- and post-, within-subjects research. While this has its place and has been a valuable design for testing educational interventions, there has been a dist...

Objective: The objective was to conduct a systematic review describing the competencies required from nurses working in neonatal intensive care settings. Design: Systematic review. Data sources: A total of eight databases, including PubMed, Scopus, CINAHL, MEDLINE, Mednar, Web of Science, ProQuest and Medic, were screened for relevant literatu...

Aim: To describe practical nursing students', mentors' and educators' perceptions of student learning and assessment of learning progress during work-based learning. Design: A qualitative descriptive study. Methods: The research data were collected by interviewing eight practical nursing students, 12 mentors and eight educators (total n = 28)...

Aims: This study aimed to identify mentors' cultural competence profiles at mentoring culturally and linguistically diverse nursing students in clinical practice and explore associating factors. Background: Globalization has had a significant impact on healthcare, increasing the diversity of healthcare workforces and the number of culturally and...

Aim To describe nurse educators' views of how culturally and linguistically diverse future registered nurses are integrated into healthcare settings. Design A qualitative descriptive design was adopted. Participants A total of 20 nurse educators were recruited from three higher education institutions in Finland. Methods Participants were recruit...

Background: Healthcare professionals' digital health competence is an important phenomenon to study as healthcare practices are changing globally. Recent research aimed to define this complex phenomenon and identify the current state of healthcare professionals' competence in digitalisation but did not include an overarching outlook when measuring...

Background Different types of educational approaches are needed to build a mentor's competence in guiding students during clinical practice; this education should be provided in an interprofessional setting. Objectives The objective of this review was to evaluate how effective mentoring education interventions are at improving mentoring competence...

Background: The international mobility has increased cultural diversity in social- and health care. As such, ethical and cultural competence is an essential skill among educators. They are promoting the ethical and cultural competence and professional growth of students with diverse backgrounds and, therefore, must be ethically and culturally comp...

Aim This study aims to describe culturally and linguistically diverse nurses’ experiences of how they transferred their competence to meet professional competence requirements in non-English speaking environment. Background Competence is one factor that affects culturally and linguistically diverse nurses’ integration into the working environment....

Background The nursing shortage is a global and ongoing phenomenon that is expected to worsen. In many countries, imbalances in the nursing workforce will require international recruitment and plans to increase domestic and international nursing graduates. Nurses from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds have been reported to experienc...

Due to the rapid digitalization of healthcare, it is important to strengthen professionals’ digital competence, particularly to support older professionals to stay in work until retirement age. People of different ages have different digital competencies. Younger generations are ‘digital natives’ who have learned to use digital devices fluently fro...

https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/display_record.php?ID=CRD42021226578.

Background Health care experts need high levels of competence, yet there is little evidence on the influence of digital learning on health science students' competence development. Objectives This study aims to describe health sciences students' experiences of the development of their competence and the influences of digital learning upon their co...

Background Understanding how culturally and linguistically diverse students experience clinical practice and their competence development is important to retaining registered nurses. This study aimed to describe culturally and linguistically diverse students' experiences of clinical practice, perceptions of their career path, and intentions to stay...

An educator’s competence influences the implementation of evidence-based education and the overall quality of social and health care. This study aimed to identify distinct competence profiles from Finnish social, health and rehabilitative care educators, as well as describe which personal and professional characteristics influenced belonging to a c...

Aims The aim of this umbrella review was to establish recent evidence on integration strategies and models to support transition and adaptation of culturally and linguistically diverse nursing staff into healthcare environments. Design Umbrella review conducted according to joanna briggs institute guidelines. Data sources Data were collected from...

Background Peer mentoring in nursing is imperative to both mentors' and mentees' personal and professional development. Yet, there is a dearth of reviews appraising the relevant qualitative and quantitative studies reported in the literature. Objectives To synthesize the best evidence exploring the impacts of peer mentoring programs on nursing stu...

Aim To develop and psychometrically test a Preceptors’ Orientation Competence Instrument measuring orientation competence of nurses working as new employee preceptors. Background Competence of nurse preceptor is essential for a successful preceptorship and thus nursing staff´s commitment to the organization. Design Instrument development accordin...

Aims To identify distinct orientation competence profiles amongst nurse preceptors and explain the associated factors. Design A cross‐sectional study design. Methods The data were collected during the winter of 2020–2021 from registered nurses (N = 8279, n = 844) at one university hospital in Finland through an online questionnaire that included...

Background The number of people with chronic and long-term conditions has increased during recent decades; this has been addressed by leveraging information and communication technology (ICT) to develop new self-care solutions. However, many of the developed technological solutions have not been tested in terms of impact(s) on patients' quality of...

Background Previous studies have investigated the competence of social and health care educators from different perspectives. However, there has been little research on the collegiality competence of social and health educators. Aim / Objective The purpose of this study was to develop and psychometrically test a new collegiality competence instrum...

Last year, the global pandemic forced us to rethink education by applying social distancing in education and workplace training. Fortunately, current technologies make it possible to organize teaching and learning online, synchronously as well as asynchronously. Literature indicates that online learning did not negatively impact cognitive learning...

The digital competence of health sciences educators is important for the delivery and development of modern education and lifelong learning. The aim of the study was to assess the appearance of digital competence in the work of Finnish health sciences educators and to determine whether educators' background factors are related to the areas of digit...

Background Those who mentor nursing students from diverse backgrounds should be educationally prepared to provide safe, culturally appropriate mentoring in clinical learning environments. Objective To evaluate the effects of an educational intervention on mentors' competence in mentoring culturally and linguistically diverse nursing students durin...

Health care professionals need continuous education to maintain the competencies required to provide high-quality care; in today’s world, this means an understanding of digital health services. Insight into health care professionals’ experiences of which aspects influence their digital health competence development is therefore highly relevant. Th...

Aims: To identify current evidence on healthcare managers' competence in knowledge management. Background: Although successful knowledge management improves the quality of care and performance of healthcare organizations, there is limited evidence on healthcare managers' competence in knowledge management Evaluation A scoping review was conducte...

Background Social- and health care educators collaborate on national and international levels; this collaboration is intrinsically related to collegiality, a concept which has only been scarcely studied among social- and health care educators. Objectives To identify the best evidence on social- and health care educators' experiences of collegialit...

Aims and objectives: This study aims to provide insight into healthcare professionals' lived experiences of digital health competence with the objective of improving the knowledge of how digital health competence is perceived by healthcare professionals. Background: Healthcare professionals need to adjust to the digital era to provide quality an...

The role of clinical nurse educators is essential in improving the quality of mentoring, supporting students’ learning and professional development during clinical training. The purpose was to explore the competence profiles of clinical nurse educators and background factors associated with these profiles. Data of this cross-sectional study were co...

Aims This study aimed to explore mentoring competence in nursing student mentors during clinical practice by identifying different mentor profiles and connections between different competence areas among five European countries and Japan. Methods The study implemented a cross-sectional design in Finland, Italy, Lithuania, Slovenia, Spain, and Japa...

During clinical practice, students become acquainted with the key work tasks associated with their professions. Students need more support from healthcare educators during clinical practice learning, particularly in challenging situations. This study aimed to describe healthcare educators’ experiences of challenging situations during clinical pract...

Aims To describe the mentoring competence of clinical practice nurse mentors and identify different mentor profiles. Design Cross-sectional research design, secondary analysis. Methods An international, cross-sectional study design was performed in five European countries. A total of 1 604 mentors from 33 healthcare organizations participated in...

The purpose of this pilot study was to explore connection of an educational intervention on the competence of health care educators and educator candidates (n=11) in digital pedagogy as a part of national TerOpe project. An educational intervention, Basics of Digital Pedagogy was developed by the TerOpe project’s experts. The participating educator...

Older people are present in a variety of nursing settings and have distinct care needs. Evidence about the competencies required is crucial when developing the profession. The aim of the study was to describe competence areas relevant in gerontological nursing. A qualitative, descriptive study design was used with 27 participants included. Finnish...

Background Social and healthcare operating environments are constantly evolving, so educators have major responsibility for ensuring that Evidence-Based Healthcare is included in the education of future healthcare professionals and applied in their practice. A holistic understanding and implementation of evidence-based healthcare competence is crit...

This European Union (EU) guideline aims to strengthen clinical nurse mentors’ mentoring competence development, which can improve health system resilience in EU countries. The guideline is based on critically evaluated research evidence and has been developed during the years 2018-2021 through the Erasmus+ project - Quality Mentorship for Developin...

Aim The study aimed to describe and explain the self-assessed gerontological nursing competence levels of Finnish nursing students and factors relating to it. Design A cross-sectional study design, reported by The Strengthening the Reporting of Observational studies in Epidemiology guidelines. Methods Data were collected with the GeroNursingCom i...

Aim To test a model of clinical learning that focuses on the role of the ward manager. Background The ward manager’s role in supporting clinical learning indirectly focuses on the ward climate connected to students’ clinical placements. In this way, the ward manager influences both nursing care and the pedagogical atmosphere in the ward. Design C...

Aim The purpose of the study was to identify and describe the characteristic profiles of evidence-based practice competence of educators in the social, health and rehabilitation sectors and to establish relevant background factors. Design This study was carried out as a descriptive cross-sectional study. Methods Data were collected from social, h...

The College of Nursing in Celje was the coordinator of the European development and research project Quality mentorship for developing competent nursing students (QualMent), which was selected under the Erasmus+ Programme, Strategic Partnerships in Higher Education. The project includes as partners: The College of Nursing in Celje (Slovenia), Unive...

The objective of this work was to develop and test an empirical model of social and healthcare educators' continuing professional development. A cross‐sectional survey study design was adopted, and a total of 422 part‐time and full‐time social and healthcare educators from 28 universities of applied sciences and vocational schools in different regi...

The social and health care educator's role in educating future professionals need to be stronger emphasised and deserves international recognition. The purpose of this study was to develop and test an empirical model of social and health care educators' competence in higher and professional education. The presented research employed a cross-section...

Background and purpose Educators’ ethical competence is of crucial importance for developing students’ ethical thinking. Previous studies describe educators’ ethical codes and principles. This article aims to widen the understanding of health- and social care educators’ ethical competence in relation to core values and ethos. Theoretical backgroun...

Introduction and aim: Cultural differences have significant impacts on classroom behaviours and communication in teaching. The aim of this study is to explore social and healthcare educators' cultural competence in transcultural education. Methodology: Data was collected from semi-structured focus group interviews at universities of applied science...

Future social‐ and health‐care educators will be required to have versatile competence in educating professionals that reflects both the constantly changing health‐care environment and delivery of high‐quality patient care. Continuing professional development can be defined as a process that aims to increase educators' competence and well‐being, al...