This is a qualitative, exploratory, descriptive and interpretative study. The objective of the study is to relate the conceptions that professors and students have over competencies with the teaching-learning process of nursing diagnosis. The study was carried out at the Nursing School of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul. The information was collected in two stages. The first one through eight semi-structured individual interviews and the second one through two focus groups. One of them was formed by students and the other group was formed by professors. Content analysis was used as analysis methodology. As a result three categories were found: relation with knowledge, teaching-learning strategies and institutional context of the course.
professional competence; nursing diagnosis; teaching; learning