Determine the relationship between nursing certification status and transport safety competency scores. c. Hypothesis: There will be a significant and positive relationship between certification status and safety competency scores.

Aim 3. Determine the relationship between nursing certification status and transport safety competency scores.

1. 1. Hypothesis: There will be a significant and positive relationship between certification status and safety competency scores.

Methodology

This was a cross-sectional project using an online survey. The survey included demographic questions (e.g., age, biological sex, ethnicity, certification type, years in transport, current transport engagement, and academic preparation) and an assessment tool for safety competency. We measured safety competency with an adapted version of the 22-item Critical Care Nursing Competence Questionnaire for Patient Safety (C3Q-Safety) Scale (Okumura et al., 2019). To adapt the C3Q-Safety Scale for transport nursing, we first reviewed the 22 items and matched them with the Air & Surface Transport Nurses Association (ASTNA) safety standards. Then, five transport nursing experts reviewed the 22 items for face validity and relevance to ASTNA safety standards. The scale was further revised based on feedback from the subject matter experts. The C3Q-Safety scale assesses four safety factors: decision making, collaboration, nursing intervention, and principles of nursing care. The original C3Q-Safety scale has a Cronbach’s alpha ranging from 0.73 to 0.83 (Okumura et al., 2019). The adapted C3Q-Safety scale (A-C3Q-Safety Scale) had a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.80. Members of the Air and Surface Transport Nurses Association (ASTNA) representing 2200 transport nurses were invited to participate. These transport nurses could be active or non-active practitioners of transport nursing, practicing ground or air (i.e., fixed-wing airplane or rotorcraft such as a helicopter) transport nursing, and have a range of nursing licenses from registered nurses to advance practice nurses. A series of 3 recruitment emails were sent to all members over a 3-week period by the ASTNA Executive Director.  The email included a link to the Qualtrix survey. The project was reviewed and approved by the Purdue Institutional Review Board (IRB number 2020-1507.). T-tests were used to compare C3Q-Safety scores between those who were certified versus not, and multiple linear regression testing to determine factors associated with C3Q-Safety scores. Only those with complete C3Q-safety scale and nursing certification results were included in the analysis (n=302).