Applied Nursing Research最新文献

Aim

The aim of this study was to determine the effects of mindfulness and self-compassion skills on the experienced stress and work satisfaction of emergency department (ED) and intermediate care unit employees.

Methods

All ED and intermediate care unit employees in the study hospital were invited to participate in an introductory lecture about mindfulness, compassion, and the intervention in January 2020. After the lecture, it was possible to enroll in training. This training was postponed due to Covid-19 and started in October 2020.

Results

The most important findings of this study are that instructor-led mindfulness training, and the regular use of a smartphone mindfulness application can significantly reduce stress and burnout and promote mindfulness and well-being of ED and intermediate care unit personnel.

Conclusions

This study shows that compact mindfulness training via innovative digital technology has a positive effect in reducing ED and intermediate care unit employees stress and burnout, while improving mindfulness and well-being, and this is consistent with the wider literature.

Key findings

The regular practice of smartphone-guided mindfulness can reduce stress and burnout, as well as promote mindfulness and well-being among ED and intermediate care unit employees.

Aims

To identify and compare new or increased nursing tasks in South Korea during the pandemic, categorized by hospital type and department.

Background

Although COVID-19 is no longer considered a global public health emergency, the threat of novel infectious diseases remains. Reflecting on the COVID-19 pandemic is essential to prepare effectively for future outbreaks.

Methods

This cross-sectional exploratory study, following the STROBE checklist, included 948 registered nurses with more than a year of clinical experience currently working in various hospitals. Questionnaires gathered demographic data, work characteristics, and the frequency of nursing task performance. Statistical analysis encompassed descriptive and inferential methods.

Results

The most common new or increased nursing task across all hospital types was ‘Access control for family caregivers.’ General wards prioritized tasks related to family caregivers, while specialized units like ICU and ER focused on infection control.

Conclusion

Understanding how COVID-19 has impacted nursing tasks is crucial for gaining insights into efficient resource allocation, targeted education, and policy formulation during similar public health crises. The pandemic has given rise to new family caregiver-related tasks in the nursing profession. Consequently, continuous nursing research is essential for establishing guidelines and fostering a supportive work environment, which is crucial for the successful implementation of these tasks.

Aim

To determine the influence of ergonomics on individual work performance of nurse educators working at home during the COVID-19 pandemic and to develop a model of the moderating effect of home environment.

Design

Cross-sectional, predictive-correlational design.

Methods

Utilizing interaction moderation and structural equation modeling, 214 consecutively-selected educators from nursing schools in the Greater Manila Area, Philippines completed a four-part online survey.

Results

Physical, cognitive, and organizational ergonomics positively influenced individual work performance. Home environment had a linear, positive moderation on the effects of physical and cognitive ergonomics on individual work performance but had a negative moderating effect with organizational ergonomics.

Conclusion

The moderated model underscored the positive effects of ergonomics and the moderating effect of home environment on the individual work performance of nurse educators working at home during the COVID-19 pandemic, and this knowledge can be used in developing appropriate programs, strategies, and policies.

Impact

The moderated model highlights the need for policies and programs, training and education, and organizational evaluation geared towards promoting healthy workplace and work-life balance among nurse educators transitioning to remote work and online teaching.

Patient or public contribution

Eligible participants contributed in the data collection with the survey responses.

Aim

This study explores nurses' experiences in migration for employment and professional abandonment in Barcelona (Spain).

Methods

Employing a mixed-design approach comprising 1) a qualitative descriptive phenomenological study, followed by 2) a subsequent cross-sectional study, 20 and 225 nurses participated in each study, respectively. Qualitative data, gathered through 4 focus group discussions, underwent inductive thematic analysis, following the Consolidated Criteria for Reporting Qualitative Research (COREQ) guidelines, while quantitative data were descriptively analyzed.

Findings

Three qualitative themes emerged: 1) Migration motives, such as improved job opportunities, permanent contracts, continuous training, and professional recognition; 2) Reasons for leaving or contemplating leaving the profession, including excessive workload, lack of recognition, limited development, and exhaustion; 3) Nurses' needs, encompassing more staffing, improved remuneration, permanent contracts, flexible schedules, greater autonomy, and career growth. The cross-sectional study revealed a 13.5 % professional abandonment rate at some point across all demographics and seniority levels. Migration trends varied by professional experience, with younger nurses seeking better conditions and opportunities elsewhere.

Conclusions

Multifactorial causes underlie job migration and professional abandonment, necessitating comprehensive interventions to improve nurses' working and professional conditions.

Introduction

The Shared Trauma Professional Post Traumatic Growth Inventory (STPPG) was developed by Tosone et al. (2014) to help understand shared trauma (ST) in social workers. ST occurs when the healthcare professional and client both experience the same collective traumatic event. This inventory has been adapted for use with mental health nurses. A cross-sectional study of N = 552 mental health nurses was completed in the spring of 2023 to assess the feasibility of using the STPPG to explore shared trauma in mental health nurses.

Methods

An exploratory factor analysis was run for the STPPG using squared multiple correlations with the maximum likelihood method.

Results

The alpha coefficient ranged from 0.82 to 0.89 for 2-factors and 0.73 to 0.89 for 3-factors. The results indicated that all correlations were significant among the total scales and subscales. All correlations were positive, ranging from 0.81 to 0.95 for two factors and 0.58 to 0.89 for three factors.

Conclusion

The STPPG has confirmed a two-factor analysis for mental health nurses. The STPPG is a valid inventory to measure ST in mental health nurses and will allow the concept to be further studied.

Background

It is known that heel offloading devices are widely used in clinical practice for the prevention of heel pressure ulcers, even though there is a lack of robust, good quality evidence to inform their use.

Objective

To explore how and why heel offloading devices are used (or not used) and reasoning behind their use in population at high risk of developing heel pressure ulcers.

Methods

An ethnographic study was conducted as part of a realist evaluation in three orthopaedic wards in a large English hospital. Twelve observations took place, with 49 h and 35 min of patient care observed. A total of 32 patients were observed and 19 members of the nursing team were interviewed and in-depth interviews with the three ward managers were conducted.

Results

Although the focus of the study was on offloading devices, constant low pressure heel specific devices were also observed in use for pressure ulcer prevention, whilst offloading devices were perceived to be for higher risk patients or those already with a heel pressure ulcer. Nursing staff viewed leadership from the ward manager and the influence of the Tissue Viability Nurse Specialists as key mechanisms for the proactive use of devices.

Conclusions

This study informs trial design as it has identified that a controlled clinical trial of both types of heel specific devices is required to inform evidence-based practice. Involving the ward managers and Tissue Viability Nurse Specialists during set up phase for clinical equipoise could improve recruitment.

Tweetable abstract

How, for whom, and in what circumstances do devices work to prevent heel pressure ulcers? Observations of clinical practice.

Objectives

Analyze and verify the association between working conditions and the occurrence of errors in nursing work.

Background

Many of the known errors in nursing are based on the structural failure of the complex health service system. Our study addresses the question “Is there an association between errors made by nursing workers and working conditions?”

Methods

The study was carried out through a cross-sectional exploratory analysis of 19 ethical-disciplinary processes focused on errors made by nursing workers. The articles were processed, judged, and archived at the Regional Nursing Councils of the Northeast Region of Brazil from 2000 to 2018. The chi-square test or Fisher's exact test was used to verify the relationship between the variables through multivariate analysis.

Results

The analyzes show that working conditions can interfere at occurrence in error. This increases the chance of an “inconsequential” error occurring for the patient in poor/very poor working conditions. The most serious errors, “with consequences irreversible” for the patient, only occur from more severe working conditions. Adversely, it was found that there is no statistically significant difference in the frequency of errors in hospitals (33.33 %) compared to “other places” (28.58 %) when these occurred in poor working conditions. When conducting the incident in poor working conditions, there was a minimum of 52 % protection OR = 0.48 % [0.16; 11.80]; (1–0.48)) against these errors in general in the nursing area.

Conclusion

The strong association was exposed in working conditions classified as bad/very bad/very bad, resulting in the most serious errors and with irreversible consequences for patients. However, a level of protection for different types of workers was noticed in the field, which shows that there is hope that if the work environment changes with more organization, management, and standards of care, we can prevent future errors.

Background

Working in the perioperative context is complex and challenging. The continual evaluation in this environment underscores the need for adaptability to technological advancements, and requires substantial allocation of resources for training and education. This study aimed to explore personality characteristics of nurse anesthetists and surgical nurses that are instrumental for sustainable employability in technologically advanced environment.

Methods

Exploratory, cross-sectional survey study including nurse anesthetists and surgical nurses, both certified and in training, and a sample of the normative Dutch population. Personality characteristics were identified with the Big Five Inventory, which consisted of 60 items answered on a five-point Likert scale (strongly disagree to strongly agree).

Results

Specific personality traits were found for nurse anesthetists and surgical nurses when compared to the normative Dutch population. Traits of both nurse anesthetists and surgical nurses differed significantly on all domains of the Big Five Inventory, with the largest differences found within the dimension negative emotionally.

Conclusions

This study highlights the role of specific personality traits in maintaining employability within the rapidly evolving and technologically advanced landscape of healthcare. It emphasizes the relationship between individual traits and professional excellence, being crucial educational strategies for overall improvement in healthcare.

Background

The aging population in Taiwan has resulted in an increase in the dependent population and the care load on caregivers. Shared care is an interpersonal process in which support is “traded” to “handle” chronic illnesses by home-care patients and family caregivers. The scale of shared care has received little attention in the Taiwanese cultural context. Thus, this study examined the reliability and validity of the Taiwanese versions of Shared Care Instrument-Revised (SCI-R).

Methods

The content validity, construct validity, and discriminant validity were used to test the validity of the translated questionnaires. The Cronbach's α was used to examine reliability. A total of 500 older adults and their caregivers were recruited from three counties in Taiwan.

Results

The reliability and validity of the Chinese version of the scale were within the acceptable range. The Cronbach's α was between 0.838 and 0.95. However, the scale's reliability was higher than that of the original version. This might be because of the inclusion of participants with less severe diseases than the participants in the original study, high social expectations in the Chinese traditional culture, and a large number of similar items. Future research should simplify the items and consider adopting diverse participant selection criteria.

Conclusions

The results of this study can be used to understand shared care in Taiwan.

Objectives

Drawing on findings from a qualitative study that aimed to explore the knowledge and attitudes of nurses from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds about voluntary assisted dying (VAD). The study also aimed to identify the strategies that assist nurses in their readiness and preparation for exposure to VAD. This paper reports on the educational content and strategies that could assist nurses from CALD backgrounds to be better prepared when they encounter VAD requests.

Background

Around the world, healthcare professionals have roles to play in caring for patients requesting voluntary assisted dying. Nurses, particularly those from diverse geographic and clinical settings, have voiced inadequate knowledge and understanding about voluntary assisted dying.

Design

A qualitative descriptive approach was undertaken.

Methods

Data collection involved one focus group and 16 in-depth interviews. A total of 21 nurses from CALD backgrounds were recruited from one Australian state. Thematic analysis was conducted to interpret the data.

Findings

Nurses identified their knowledge gaps and specified the need for education and workplace training on VAD, its legal and ethical aspects, clarity on their role, communication techniques and how VAD intersects with their practice. They suggested various teaching strategies that could prepare nurses to work safely and confidently in a clinical environment where voluntary assisted dying is an option for patients.

Conclusion

Given the high number of nurses from diverse backgrounds working in the Australian health sector, these nurses need to be fully prepared to care for patients requesting VAD.