During the last decades nurse-education has become more oriented towards scientific knowledge. Nursing-theories are taught at school and new nurses are prepared to use them in their clinical practice. However, when graduated and entering the clinical reality the nurses describe that this kind of knowledge are not always appreciated while experienced nursing leaders describes that the new nurses have a kind of knowledge that doesn’t always fit into the existing system. Thus, it is a problem when to different paradigms – one that is more practical and skill-oriented and one where actions are theory-driven – meets. What usually happens is that the new nurses either quit their work or adapt to the old system, thus preserving old knowledge and old routines instead of contributing to the development of nursing care in their units.
In order to deal with this the county hospital and the university arranged an education for nursing leaders. The education, “Leadership on Good Caring” took place on advanced level during a five-month period. The nursing leaders was simultaneously working and given 8 credits when passing the examination seminars. In the course the leaders was given an introduction to the content in today’s nurse-education. The main parts of the course consisted in three integrated parts; caring science and nursing theories, building good teams, and approaches to care-development. During the first part focus was on the Finish nurse-theorist Eriksson’s theory of caritative caring, focusing issues relating to the importance of a basic value-system for the development of a caring culture. In their exams the leaders presented plans for how to implement nursing theory at their units in order not only to improve care but also to engage their teams in this process. This paper will not only describe the education but also what kind of projects it resulted in.