Ibero-American Consensus on Communication Skills for Nursing Degree students.

OBJECTIVE:as a health care profession focused on caring for people, Nursing requires sound communication skills. Based on an international expert consensus, a proposal on learning outcomes in clinical communication for undergraduate Nursing education curricula in Spanish speaking countries is presented. METHOD:a steering committee, consisting of 5 nurses and experts in communication in health care sciences, drew up the first list of communication skills specific to the Nursing degree. Their proposal was reviewed and improved by a committee of 7 international scientific advisers. 70 experts from 14 countries were selected using a snowball sampling procedure and invited to participate in a distance modified Delphi consensus process in two survey rounds. Statistical analysis was carried out to establish the final consensus level for each item. RESULTS:a questionnaire with 68 learning outcomes in clinical communications was submitted for panel assessment. In the first Delphi round, the panel reached a statistical consensus on all the items assessed. There was no need for a second round to reconcile positions. CONCLUSION:an academic proposal, approved by a high level of international consensus, is presented to guide and unify the learning outcomes on the clinical communication curriculum for undergraduate Nursing studies in Spanish speaking countries.