Professional adjustment refers to the holistic growth of an individual and the development of their capability to provide satisfactory professional service in a specific area of practice to provide service to society. In the context of nursing, professional adjustment involves changes in behavior towards better life, better relationships, and better contribution to society. It is an educational process that involves the following:

• Changes in behavior towards better life, better relationships, and better contribution to society.
• A calling by which a nurse assumes the obligation to uphold the noble traditions of the profession.
• A profound devotion to professional duties and genuine concern in the advancement of the profession for the promotion of public health and public welfare.
• Familiarizing oneself with the various routines, methods, or idiosyncrasies of physicians, so that smooth relationships can be maintained.
• Safeguarding the reputation and dignity of co-workers.
• Fulfilling civic duties to abide by the laws, to have sufficient knowledge of nursing and medical laws, and to cooperate with the state promotion of public health and welfare.

Professional adjustment is essential in nursing to ensure that nurses provide the best possible care to their patients. Negligence in professional adjustment can lead to legal issues, such as professional negligence, which is defined as a "free and rational act that presupposes knowledge of the thing which consent is being given by a person who is legally capable of giving consent". Elements of professional negligence include the existence of a duty on the part of the person charged to use due care under circumstances, failure to exercise the degree of diligence which the circumstances of the particular case demand, mistaken identity, wrong medicine, wrong concentration, wrong route, and wrong dose, defects in equipment that may result in injuring the patients, errors due to family assistance, and administration of medicine without a doctors prescription. The doctrine of Res Ipsa Loquitor, which means "the thing speaks for itself," applies to cases where the liability is expanded to include the master as well as the employee and not a shift of liability from the subordinate to the master. Incompetence, which is the lack of ability, legal qualifications, or fitness to discharge the required duty, is also a form of professional negligence.