A study of 1574 nurses in 6 hospitals was carried out using an questionnaire without respondent's name in order to examine the relation between working conditions and chronic, accumulative fatigue in nurses working in three-shifts. We recognized a strong relation between accumulative fatigue in nurses and work position, age, experience and marital status. In particular, having a family was an important factor in increasing motivation for work. The close relation between the number of hours worked, overtime, type of weekly holiday, and how days off and salary were obtained was also confirmed. There was an especially close relation between overtime work, type of weekly holiday and accumulative fatigue. Since the number of hours worked in a day was very long, without a regular schedule of two or more days off , an increase in the amount of mental, social and physical fatigue was confirmed. In hospitals where the number of night shifts was studied, a recommendation by the National Personnel Authority was being followed, and no difference in fatigue was seen based on the number of night shifts. The results of this study suggest that improvements aimed at implementing a full two-day weekly holiday system are necessary in order to ensure regular rests of more than one day and to improve personnel distribution to eliminate overtime.

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Oita University of Nursing and Health Sciences has an independent division of Nursing Assessment in the Department of Basic Nursing Sciences. This paper overviews the Clinical Nursing Assessment Practicum, introduced for the first time. The goal of this clinical practicum is to be able to regard their clients as whole, including emotional and social beings as well as physical beings, and be able to assess the health problems of their clients. The Clinical Nursing Assessment Practicum was conducted in the same wards as the Basic Nursing Practicum over a period of two weeks, one week after the Basic Nursing Practicum had been over. It was difficult for the students to assess their clients, because this was the first clinical practicum for the students. Moreover, they had not yet learned enough about professional nursing subjects at that moment. Even such circumstances, almost all the students finally assessed health problems of their clients and explained their own assessment processes without contradicting in the context. The students expressed that they realized the significance and the importance of assessment. Through this clinical practicum, they realized that to have adequate knowledge and skills, to gather information exactly from their clients and to establish trusting relationship with their clients were essential for assessing health problems. These students' achievement would promote their future learning.

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