Background: It is crucial to determine the intercultural sensitivity of nursing students who will provide care to refugees in the future and to examine their perspectives, experiences, and views on providing care to refugees. Objectives: The aim of this study was to describe nursing students’ perspectives and caregiving experiences with refugees in Turkey. Design: This study was conducted with a phenomenological approach in a qualitative design. Settings, participants, methods: The sample of the study consisted of 10 intern nursing students with purposive sampling method in their last year of education at the bachelor level for nursing who had experience of caring for refugees and voluntary participation in this study. The data was collected through in-depth interviews conducted with a semi-structured interview form. MAXQDA program was used to code qualitative data. Results: 74 codes gathered under four themes with related subthemes as follows: a) Perspective on refugees with three subthemes: Health, social and economic perspective, b) Barriers in cultural care and two subthemes: Barriers on language and communication and problem-solving technique, c) Feelings and barriers in nursing care, d) Recommendations and five subthemes: society, refugees government, health services, and nursing education. Students expressed that language and communication were the most significant problems when they gave care to patients. They felt helpless, insufficient, and afraid of making mistakes in providing care due to communication barriers. Nursing students suggested that education is an essential factor to increasing awareness and break prejudice towards refugees. Conclusions: Language and communication were the greatest problems when students gave care to refugees patients. Language problems could be managed by using interpreters in hospitals to decrease cultural conflicts and provide equal healthcare. In order to increase students’ cultural sensitivity and awareness, organizing training and integrating the concept of intercultural in nursing education into the curriculum could be suggested, and students should receive training to ensure they can provide culturally competent nursing care.

DOI: 10.1016/j.nedt.2021.105240
ISSN: 0260-6917