Crossing professional cultures: A qualitative study of nurses working in a medical school

Background: Leaving the nursing workforce is often seen as a loss. Some nurses maintain a current nursing registration and work within university schools of medicine. Little is known about their work. Aim: To explore and describe the experiences of nurses who work in a New Zealand medical school. Design: Qualitative descriptive informed by autoethnography. Methods: Interviews with 14 nurses over a 12-month period in 2015. Data were inductively analysed. Results: The nurses were mid-to-late career with prior clinical experience and all held postgraduate qualifications. Five themes emerged. Conclusions: Nurses chose to work in a medical school for a variety of reasons. They sought to maintain their nursing identity but the nursing profession often did not recognise them as nurses. Although individual colleagues recognised their value, organisationally, limited attention was afforded to the specific orientation, mentorship and development of nurses' careers within this setting.