Scope and organization of clinical practice in the Norwegian biomedical laboratory scientist education

Since 2005, scope and content of the biomedical laboratory scientist education have been defined by national guidelines to ensure equal final competence for all candidates. From 2019, a new regulation on national guidelines was approved. Both new and old guidelines have regulated the learning outcomes and scope of practice in education. In this study, the scope and organization of the practical studies at the various study programs are characterized, in order to investigate differences and similarities and to facilitate that the study programs can learn from each other. Data has been obtained from each study program for the scope and organization of supervised internal practice, external practice and the bachelor thesis are reported for all study programs before and after the introduction of new guidelines. This study shows differences in the scope and organization of the practice and the bachelor thesis between the study programs in Norway and especially in the organization of internal practice. At the same time, the new guidelines open up for a further interpretation of the concept of practice and of requirements for the scope and organization of practice. In order to ensure equal final competence for the graduates, regardless of place of study, there is a need to agree to a greater extent on what provides sufficient scope and good quality of clinical practice in the study programs of biomedical laboratory scientists. This descriptive study shows the need for further research collaboration between the educational institutions, in order to develop a biomedical laboratory scientist education of the best possible quality for the future.