Competency frameworks for advanced practice nursing: a literature review

Aim This paper describes a literature review that identified common traits in advanced practice nursing that are specific to competency development worldwide. Background There is a lack of international agreement on the definition of advanced practice nursing and its core competencies. Despite the lack of consensus, there is an ongoing process worldwide to establish and outline the standards and competencies for advanced practice nursing roles. Introduction International agencies, such as the I nternational C ouncil of N urses, have provided general definitions for advanced practice nursing. Additionally, a set of competency standards for this aim has been developed. Methods A literature review and a directed search of institutional websites were performed to identify specific developments in advanced practice nursing competencies and standards of practice. To determine a competency map specific to international advanced practice nursing, key documents were analysed using a qualitative approach based on content analysis to identify common traits among documents and countries. Results The review process identified 119 relevant journal articles related to advanced practice nursing competencies. Additionally, 97 documents from grey literature that were related to advanced practice nursing competency mapping were identified. From the text analysis, 17 worldwide transversal competency domains emerged. Conclusions Despite the variety of patterns in international advanced practice nursing development, essential competency domains can be found in most national frameworks for the role development of international advanced practice nursing. These 17 core competencies can be used to further develop instruments that assess the perceived competency of advanced practice nurses. Implications for Nursing and Health Policy The results of this review can help policy developers and researchers develop instruments to compare advanced practice nursing services in various contexts and to examine their association with related outcomes.