Journal of clinical nursing
-
Randomized Controlled Trial Clinical Trial
The effect of music listening on acute confusion and delirium in elders undergoing elective hip and knee surgery.
This study was undertaken to determine the effect of music on elders undergoing elective hip and knee surgery who experience acute confusion and delirium postoperatively. Postoperative confusion and delirium in elders often cause complications that negatively effect recovery. Music listening was introduced as an intervention to an experimental group. ⋯ There was a significant decrease in the number of episodes of postoperative confusion among those in the experimental group compared with those in the non-listening control group. In addition, the experimental group had significantly higher scores on the readiness-to-ambulate profile than the control group. These findings indicate that music listening is an effective nursing intervention that can be used to decrease acute postoperative confusion and delirium in elders undergoing elective hip and knee surgery.
-
In Sweden and internationally, little research has focused on the working situation of Enrolled Nurses and Nurses' Aides who form the majority of workers in geriatric care today. With this in mind, it is important to focus on how these occupational groups experience their working situation with older residents in municipal care. ⋯ The findings can be used when other nursing homes in municipal care are opened, as a means of preventing work dissatisfaction and increasing work satisfaction among future employees.
-
Little research has examined the care older people receive in the acute surgical setting. Although pain assessment and management are judged to be a priority in nursing, often pain, in older people, is undermanaged for a variety of reasons. Factors such as stoicism, communication and ageism can shape both the patients' and nurses' attitude towards the perception of pain which subsequently affects pain management. ⋯ It is suggested that to improve pain management there is a need to individualize pain assessment for older people and to assist clinicians with enhancing their education and decision-making abilities in this field. This may best be achieved by supporting a programme of change to develop the skills of staff and encouraging learning through reflective practice. There is however a need for further research in this area.
-
Preventive actions targeting community-dwelling frail older people will be increasingly important with the growing number of very old and thereby also frail older people. This study aimed to explore and summarize the empirical literature on recent studies of case/care management interventions for community-dwelling frail older people and especially with regard to the content of the interventions and the nurse's role and outcome of it. Very few of the interventions took either a preventive or a rehabilitative approach using psycho-educative interventions focusing, for instance, on self-care activities, risk prevention, health complaints management or how to preserve or strengthen social activities, community involvement and functional ability. ⋯ To this end it may be useful for nurses to strengthen their psychosocial skills or develop close collaboration with social workers. The outcome measures examined in this study represented one of three perspectives: the consumer's perspective, the perspective of health care consumption or the recipient's health and functional ability. Perhaps effects would be expected in all three areas and thus these should be included in evaluative studies in addition to measures for family and/or informal caregiver's strain and satisfaction.