International journal of nursing studies
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High profile accounts of failures in patient care reflect an urgent need for transformational development in healthcare. Appreciative Inquiry is promoted as an approach to exploring and bringing about change in social systems. Appreciative Inquiry has been used extensively in North American business since the late 1980s. The application of Appreciative Inquiry may have merit in the complex world of human health experiences. ⋯ Appreciative Inquiry offers potential for nurse practice development and change but not without cognisance of the pivotal components. If Appreciative Inquiry is to be perceived as a legitimate research endeavour, there must be engagement and attention to rigour. Findings suggest caution is required against the choreography of Appreciative Inquiry where participant experiences are moulded to fit a previously drafted master plan. Further research is needed to explore the role of expert facilitation in securing and sustaining successful outcomes of Appreciative Inquiry.
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Anxiety is an unpleasant emotion that most intensive care patients experience. This emotion is an important issue in intensive care settings because of its prevalence, adverse effects and severity. Little is known about the factors associated with state and trait anxiety during critical illness. ⋯ This study provides a better understanding of contributing factors for anxiety in the critically ill. Trait anxiety and state anxiety were significantly associated with each other, namely, patients who were anxious by nature experienced higher levels of state anxiety, which persisted throughout their stay in the intensive care unit. Recognising the importance of state and trait anxiety assessments using validated tools and determining ways to manage anxiety in the critically ill are critical aspects of the intensive care nurses role.
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Job stress and burnout are common among healthcare professionals, and nurses in particular. In addition to the heavy workload and lack of recourses, nurses are also confronted with emotionally intense situations associated with illness and suffering, which require empathic abilities. Although empathy is one of the core values in nursing, if not properly balanced it can also have detrimental consequences, such as compassion fatigue. Self-compassion, on the other hand, has been shown to be a protective factor for a wide range of well-being indicators and has been associated with compassion for others. ⋯ High levels of affective empathy may be a risk factor for compassion fatigue, whereas self-compassion might be protective. Teaching self-compassion and self-care skills may be an important feature in interventions that aim to reduce burnout and compassion fatigue.
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Heelstick is the most frequently performed skin-breaking procedure in the neonatal intensive care units (NICUs). There are no large multicenter studies describing the frequency and analgesic approaches used for heelsticks performed in NICUs. ⋯ Heelstick was very frequently performed in NICUs. Although, most heelsticks were performed with analgesia, this was not systematic. The high frequency of this procedure and the known adverse effects of repetitive pain in neonates should encourage the search of safe and effective strategies to reduce their number.
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Self-management may be a lifelong task for patients with chronic back pain. Research suggests that chronic pain self-management programmes have beneficial effects on patients' health outcome. Contemporary pain management theories and models also suggest that a good patient-professional partnership enhances patients' ability to self-manage their condition. ⋯ This study suggests that the increase in patients' self-management ability may lead to improvement in HRQoL after pain management support provided in a partnership with health professionals. A good patient-professional partnership appears to be beneficial as an augmentation to self-management practice for patients with chronic back pain.