Abstract
OBJECTIVE: To explore the challenges of clinical education from the perspective of clinical instructors and clinical staff at Dire Dawa University College of Health Science. METHODS: An institutional-based phenomenological qualitative study was conducted. Clinical instructors and staff provided data through in-depth interviews and key informant discussions, which were facilitated by a semistructured tool and a voice recorder. A total of 17 participants, including 11 in-depth interviews (IDIs) with clinical instructors (including two key informants) and six IDIs with clinical staff were included in this study. A purposive sampling method was used to select study participants, and the data were analyzed thematically using the computer-assisted qualitative data analysis software Atlas.ti7. The thematic analysis with an inductive approach involves six steps: familiarization, coding, generating themes, reviewing themes, defining and naming themes, and writing. RESULTS: Clinical instructors and clinical staff noted a number of challenges in clinical education, including insufficient medical equipment, low incentives, clinical site repetition, unfavorable clinical practice sites, lack of communication from instructors, skill attrition, lack of orientation for instructors and students, client/patient unwelcomingness, uncooperative healthcare workers, and poor university cooperation. CONCLUSION: The aforementioned issues contributed to the quality of clinical education and its desired impact, as outlined in this research. A multidisciplinary and collaborative effort is needed to address these challenges.