Aim:

To illuminate nurses' experiences of caring for sick children community home healthcare.

Background:

There is an international consensus that children with different types of medical

conditions, to an extent as far as possible, should receive care in their homes. Home healthcare allows the family to stay together when the child is undergoing treatment and thus reduces the strain on the family. Children as a patient group is a relatively new phenomenon in community home healthcare in Sweden and represents a fairly small part of the community nurse responsibilities, which make it difficult to accumulate experience and practice.

Design:

The study used a qualitative, descriptive design.

Methods:

Individual interviews were conducted with twelve nurses working in community healthcare

in the western parts of Sweden. Qualitative content analysis was used to analyse the data.

Results:

One overall theme, "to feel confident in order to create confidence", two main themes,"to

build a trusting relationship with the family" and "to feel confident in the role as caregivers", emerged

together with six subthemes. The nurses aimed at creating a trusting nursing relationship and

working closely with the parents. The feeling of confidence in their role as caregivers was closely connected to the level of support and knowledge the nurses received.

Conclusion:

Many nurses felt unsecure due to the task of caring for children in community home

healthcare. However, most nurses experienced the situation as manageable with peer support and distinct collaboration with the hospital. Guidance and education was called for in order to experience greater confidence in the professional role as caregivers.

Relevance to clinical practice:

The implication of the study may contribute to efforts being made to extend and improve cooperation between remitting pediatric clinic and community healthcare