Introduction:

Advanced chronic kidney disease is a major health problem in which nursing cares, and therefore the training of future professionals, are essential.

Objective:

To evaluate the perception of knowledge and degree of interest in nephrology nursing of nursing students at the University of Oviedo.

Material and Method:

Descriptive observational study carried out between January and May 2019, including all the students enrolled in the nursing degree who gave written consent. A self-prepared questionnaire was used, which included sociodemographic variables and 12 closed questions with categorical responses (yes / no / don't know) and Likert type (scale from 0 to 10). A descriptive analysis was performed and Student's t tests and ANOVA were used to search for significant differences.

Results:

Two hundred and fifty-one questionnaires were obtained, with a rejection rate of less than 1%. 86% were women between 18-54 years old. The average of total knowledge for the four courses was less than 5, finding statistically significant differences by age (p <0.003), but not by sex, academic year or profession. The importance of nephrology training was perceived with a mean of 8,79±0,29 points, and interest in nephrology nursing training had a mean of 3,82±0,61 points.

Conclusions:

The students' perception of knowledge in nephrology nursing is insufficient despite perceiving it as very necessary for their training. Although, if the specialty existed, they show little interest in this training.