Background: Gender stereotypes influence both women and men who work as nurses as well as individuals considering nursing as a profession. The aim of this study was to explore male and female nursing students’ experiences and perspectives regarding gender-defined roles as well as how they view their future professional roles. Methods: The study used a descriptive qualitative design. A convenience sample included 72 full-time second- and third-year undergraduate nursing students. Data were collected in 2017 using a self-administered qualitative questionnaire consisting of 11 essay-type questions. As an additional data collection method, a drawing method was applied. The data were analysed by content analysis separately for the male and female perspectives. Results: Altogether, eight themes emerged, with half explaining the male and the other half the female students’ perspectives. Students choose nursing for altruistic, opportunistic and organisational reasons. Among the female students, another reason “family and social incentives” was also identified. Female students’ vision of their future professional role included altruism and positive representations of ‘being a nurse’, whereas the male students’ vision included management and leadership, and technical aspects of nursing. Conclusions: Both male and female nursing students face the limits of their own gender roles, yet they are prepared to challenge these gender-based perceptions. Tackling stereotypes and raising public awareness, using gender-inclusive language and strategies for recruitment, ensuring gender diversity in nursing teams and revising the nursing curriculum where appropriate, are just some of the implications that arise to help overcome gender differences.

Patients are entitled to culturally competent care. Nurses must be prepared to recognize patients’ needs that derive from their culture and to develop skills that will facilitate their achievement. Nursing curricula therefore need to include a cultural content and student nurses need to be culturally competent. The aim is to use cultural knowledge to deliver culturally sensitive and congruent care. Transcultural nursing education does not exist as a course in undergraduate or postgraduate nursing programs in Slovenia. In an effort to advance the diversity of elective courses in the postgraduate nursing program at the Faculty of Health Sciences of the University of Primorska, we tried to develop and introduce transcultural nursing into the existing curriculum. The aim of the paper is to outline the development of transcultural nursing content as it was set in the course curriculum and planned teaching and learning approaches

Nurses play an important role in pharmaceutical care. They are involved in: detecting clinical change; communicating/discussing pharmacotherapy with patients, their advocates, and other healthcare professionals; proposing and implementing medication-related interventions; and ensuring follow-up of patients and medication regimens. To date, a framework of nurses' competences on knowledge, skills, and attitudes as to interprofessional pharmaceutical care tasks is missing. To reach agreement with experts about nurses' competences for tasks in interprofessional pharmaceutical care. A two-phase study starting with a scoping review followed by five Delphi rounds was performed. Competences extracted from the literature were assessed by an expert panel on relevance by using the RAND/UCLA method. The experts (n = 22) involved were healthcare professionals, nurse researchers, and educators from 14 European countries with a specific interest in nurses' roles in interprofessional pharmaceutical care. Descriptive statistics supported the data analysis. The expert panel reached consensus on the relevance of 60 competences for 22 nursing tasks. Forty-one competences were related to 15 generic nursing tasks and 33 competences were related to seven specific nursing tasks. This study resulted in a competence framework for competency-based nurse education. Future research should focus on imbedding these competences in nurse education. A structured instrument should be developed to assess students' readiness to achieve competence in interprofessional pharmaceutical care in clinical practice.

The integration of digital competences into higher education is essential for the promotion of effective and sustainable teaching and learning environments. The aim of this study was to develop and validate the Digital Competence Scale for University Teachers (DCS-UT), an instrument to assess key digital competences of teachers. The development of the scale involved the creation of items based on an extensive literature review, followed by rigorous testing for content and face validity. The psychometric properties of the scale were assessed using data from 411 university teachers, with confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and structural equation modelling (SEM) to examine the underlying structure of the scale. Reliability was assessed using Cronbach’s alpha, which confirmed the internal consistency of the instrument (0.974). The analysis revealed a robust four-factor structure: digital literacy, digital skills, digital interaction, and technology integration, which together explained 70.284% of the variance. These findings underscore the value of the DCS-UT as a tool to promote sustainable teaching practises by assessing digital competences. By equipping teachers with essential digital competences, the scale supports the long-term adaptability and effectiveness of higher education institutions in an increasingly digital field.