Challenges in municipality healthcare services—The nurse leaders' perspective

Abstract

Aim To examine perceptions of key challenges that nursing leadership face when organizing healthcare services in the municipality.

Design A qualitative study involving community nurse leaders (N = 9) in two focus group interviews.

Methods The material has been processed and interpreted in accordance with the phenomenological‐hermeneutical tradition, and this process was inspired by Graneheim and Lundman.

Results Three themes were identified in this study: (a) Tension between organizing the daily work and future challenges; (b) Challenges with recruiting enough registered nurse (RNs) in municipal healthcare services; and (c) Competence development plan—a strategic tool for nursing leadership. The municipal healthcare services need a better knowledge base with better knowledge of both the content and quality of services, organization, leadership and management, thus improving new forms of work and professional approaches.