Mentoring the clinical nurse in nursing research

The purpose of this article is to describe the research mentoring process used with a small team of nurses by a PhD prepared nurse certified as a Nursing Professional Development Specialist and as a Critical Care Clinical Nurse Specialist. It will describe how bedside nurses were actively engaged in the research process by having them learn about research while operationalizing that knowledge as simultaneously were mentored in conducting a relevant research study. The process described and discussed in this article should be useful to nurse leaders to facilitate removing the traditional barriers to nursing research that still remain in healthcare organizations today. These include lack of time and knowledge, about the process, lack of institutional support, and lack of mentoring through the process. It should also be helpful to nurse educators in the clinical area to encourage more nurses to participate in nursing research.