Optimizing palliative care education through undergraduate nursing students? perceptions: Application of importance-performance analysis and Borich needs assessment model

Background: With the aging of the population and the increasing trend of chronic illnesses, the demand for palliative care is growing. Undergraduate nursing students will be the main providers of palliative care in the future. Therefore, it's important to enhance their capability for palliative care.Objectives: The purpose of this study was to optimize palliative care education, based on undergraduate nursing students' perceptions and educational needs through the application of the importance-performance analysis and Borich needs assessment model.Design: A cross-sectional descriptive study.Setting: Nursing department in Wenzhou, China.Participants: A total of 448 full-time undergraduate nursing students were recruited for the study.Methods: Importance-performance analysis was used to identify items that obtain high priority for improvement, and the Borich needs assessment model and the Locus for focus model were used to prioritize educational needs. The three methods were integrated to determine the top-priority content to meet undergraduate nursing stu-dents' educational needs in palliative care.Results: The items located in Quadrant II of Importance-performance analysis, ranked in the first 10 in Borich needs assessment, and located in Quadrant I of the Locus for focus model were defined as top-priority content. These included: "respiratory symptoms: pleural effusion, superior vena cava syndrome, respiratory difficulty," "Care of terminal symptoms," "Awareness of dying," "Care of remains," "Cooperation between interdisciplinary teams," and "Rights and interests of dying patients."Conclusion: Several years of development of palliative care education have made nursing students aware of its importance. However, they have reported that education remains insufficient. A greater focus on palliative care education is needed to ensure they are better prepared. Specific attention should be given to cooperation be-tween interdisciplinary teams, dealing with death and dying, rights and interests of people who were dying.