Journal of advanced nursing
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Review Meta Analysis
Role development and effective practice in specialist and advanced practice roles in acute hospital settings: systematic review and meta-synthesis.
This paper reports a study whose aim was to identify and synthesize qualitative research studies reporting barriers or facilitators to role development and/or effective practice in specialist and advanced nursing roles in acute hospital settings. ⋯ Relationships with other staff groups and role ambiguity are the most important factors which hinder or facilitate the implementation of specialist and advanced nursing roles. These factors seem interlinked, and the associated problems do not appear to resolve spontaneously when staff become familiar with the new roles. In order to reduce role ambiguity and the consequent likelihood of negative responses we recommend that, when specialist and advanced nursing roles are introduced, clear role definitions and objectives are developed and communicated to relevant staff groups; these definitions and objectives should be updated as necessary.