Nursing care in the transfusion of blood components to surgical patients in the perioperative period

Introduction: blood transfusion consists of the administration of blood components intravenously in clinical or surgical treatments. In the preoperative period, it is performed with the objective of improving tissue oxygenation, as well as promoting hemodynamic and hemostatic balance. Objective: to understand nursing care in the transfusion of blood components to surgical patients in the perioperative period. Method: this is a descriptive and exploratory study with a qualitative approach. Grounded Theory was used, with constant comparative analysis. A total of 18 nurses and 28 nursing technicians from a university hospital took part in the study. Data were collected between October 2019 and February 2020, through a sociodemographic questionnaire and semi-structured interviews. Results: the study resulted in the central category nursing care during transfusion, which gave rise to the categories: caring for before transfusion; caring for during transfusion; and caring for after transfusion, which were discussed according to the standardized nursing methodology. Conclusion: it was understood that nursing care is planned and implemented following an ordering of practices in a logical sequence due to the characteristics of the procedure in the perioperative period. Nurses demand indirect care; in contrast, nursing technicians engage in direct patient care.