When making clinical judgements, nurses draw from many sources including their formal nursing education and/or from their experience gained over time in practice. [1] Clinical decision making can be defined as choosing between alternatives, a skill that improves as nurses gain experience, both as a nurse and in a specific specialty. [2]
Clinical decision making requires good quality judgment including critical thinking. [3] An earlier definition of critical thinking in nursing is: '…..Critical thinkers in nursing practice the cognitive skills of analysing, applying standards, discriminating, information seeking, logical reasoning, predicting and transforming knowledge' [4 p357] It has also been highlighted that reflection on practice can be as a result of a breakdown in clinical judgement. [5]