BACKGROUND: Nurse managers need to create cultures that are worthy, not only of the commitment of everyone who comes to work but also of the trust of everyone who comes to be served. The aim of our study was to describe the challenges faced by Swedish nurse managers in a perioperative setting.

METHODS: A qualitative study was conducted. The participants were chosen by convenience sampling, and individual in-depth interviews were conducted. Data were analysed by Systematic Text Condensation. The COREQ checklist was consulted throughout the study to optimise the quality.

RESULTS: Nineteen nurse managers (all women) participated. Six themes were identified: "striving to treat employees with consideration and solicitude"; "the obligation to take care of each employee's individual needs"; "convincing others was an uphill battle", "finding solutions when things seem impossible"; "staff recruitment, allocation, and management"; "working with constantly changing planning".

CONCLUSIONS: The nurse managers faced challenges because of the overwhelming amount of work tasks, with almost no time for reflection. Having carefully chosen tasks and a realistic time schedule for each work task, plus time to find one's own path to inner peace, are essential for nurse managers. Organisations that provide these prerequisites show that they care about their nurse managers. The results of this study indicate the need for time to reflect, as well as support from superior managers and from the human resources department.

Measuring and evaluating patients' recovery, following intensive care, is essential for assessing their recovery process. By using a questionnaire, which includes spiritual and existential aspects, possibilities for identifying appropriate nursing care activities may be facilitated. The study describes the development and evaluation of a recovery questionnaire and its validity and reliability.

Background: Social interactions between registered nurses, older patients and their relatives are essential and play a central role in developing a successful care relationship in healthcare encounters. How nurses interact with patients affects the patient’s well-being. Limited time and demands for efficiency influence the encounter and complaints from patients and relatives often concern social interactions. Therefore, the aim of this study was to explore the social interaction in encounters between registered nurses, older patients and their relatives at a department of medicine for older people.

Methods: The study has an ethnographic approach including participatory observations (n = 21) and informal field conversations (n = 63), followed by a thematic analysis with an abductive approach reflecting Goffman’s interactional perspective.

Result: The result revealed a pattern where the participants manoeuvred between interplay and context. By manoeuvring, they defined roles but also created a common social situation. Nurses led the conversation; patients followed and described their health problems, while relatives captured the moment to receive and provide information. Finally, nurses summarised the encounter using ritual language, patients expressed gratitude through verbal and non-verbal expressions, while relatives verbally confirmed the agreements.

Conclusion: The social interaction between registered nurses, older patients and relatives was shaped by a pattern where the participants manoeuvred between interplay and context. When all participants assume responsibility for the social interaction, they become active and listen to each other. The approach adopted by nurses is crucial, thus training in communication and social interaction skills are important. When the asymmetry due to imbalance, is reduced, less misunderstanding and a satisfactory care relationship can be achieved.

Background

Extensive research describes how nurses experience their work environment. The conditions are described as stressful and dissatisfying with nurses intending to leave their workplace. Knowledge about the personal perception regarding why nurses consider leaving the hospital workplace is limited. The purpose of this study was to understand why hospital nurses remain in their workplace, which facilitates their continuation in the profession.

Objective

The objective was to explore and describe factors explaining why hospital nurses remain in the workplace.

Methods

This was a descriptive qualitative study with a purposive sample of hospital nurses in Sweden. The salutogenic theory was the basis for the interview guide and the semi-structured questions. Individual interviews were conducted in a hospital in western Sweden. Content analysis was performed to organize the coded data according to the sense of coherence.

Results

Data saturation was achieved with 12 interviews. Within the three themes of coherence (comprehensibility, manageability, and meaningfulness), ten subthemes were categorized from the data as follows: job satisfaction and fun at work, acknowledgement and productivity, togetherness and team security, manageable workload, variable work and challenging situations, workplace and personal space balance, collaboration and supportive leadership, valued role and good work, commitment and involvement, and pride in the professional role.

Conclusions

The main findings of this study have shown the critical importance of being in a meaningful, comprehensible and manageable work context that supports nurses in maintaining their professional identity.

BACKGROUND: Parents of children with cancer experience a demanding situation and often suffer from psychological problems such as stress. Trying to coping with the complex body of information about their child's disease is one factor that contributes to this stress. The aim of this study is to evaluate an intervention for person-centred information to parents of children with cancer that consists of four sessions with children's nurses trained in the intervention method.

METHODS/DESIGN: This is a multi-centre RCT with two parallel arms and a 1:1 allocation ratio. The primary outcome is illness-related parental stress. Secondary outcomes are post-traumatic stress symptoms, anxiety, depression, satisfaction with information, expected and received knowledge, and experiences with health care providers. A process evaluation is performed to describe experiences and contextual factors. Data are collected using web questionnaires or paper forms according to the parents' preference, audio recording of the intervention sessions, and qualitative interviews with parents and the intervention nurses.

DISCUSSION: Few studies have evaluated information interventions for parents of children with cancer using large multi-centre RCTs. This intervention is designed to be performed by regular staff children's nurses, which will facilitate implementation if the intervention proves to be effective.

TRIAL REGISTRATION: Clinical trials NCT02332226 (December 11, 2014).

Background

Nursing professionals exhibit high prevalence of stress-related health problems. Job demands and job resources are parallel drivers of health and well-being among employees. Better job resources associate with better job satisfaction, job motivation and engagement even when job demands are high. To date, there is limited research which explores the association between job demands, job resources and health outcomes among nursing professionals in the Swedish context. The aim of this study was therefore to investigate Swedish nursing professionals’ job demands and job resources in relation to health outcomes, with comparisons between the private and public healthcare sectors. The specific research questions were as follows: (1) Are there differences between private and public healthcare regarding job demands, job resources, and health outcomes? and (2) Are there prospective associations between job demands and job resources in relation to health outcomes?

Methods

Data were drawn from the Swedish Longitudinal Occupational Survey of Health (SLOSH) 2016 and 2018, including 520 nurses and 544 assistant nurses working in the private and public healthcare sectors from 2016 (baseline). Data were analyzed using binary logistic regression.

Results

Nursing professionals reported higher threats, lower bullying, lower control, lower social support, and lower cohesion in the public healthcare units compared to the private healthcare units. The prospective analyses showed that job resources in terms of social support and rewards were associated with higher self-rated health and lower burnout. Cohesion was associated with higher self-rated health. Job demands in terms of psychological demands and job efforts were associated with lower self-rated health, higher burnout, and higher sickness absence, while emotional demands were associated with higher burnout.

Conclusions

Nursing professionals’ job resources are deficient in public healthcare units. Job resources are associated with positive health outcomes, whereas job demands are associated with negative health outcomes, among nursing professionals. Strengthening job resources among nursing professionals in the private and public healthcare sectors can promote and sustain their work-related health.

Background:

Work-related health problems, such as work stress, fatigue, and burnout constitute a global challenge within the nursing profession. Work-related health among nurses is not yet a prioritized phenomenon in Nepal. Health-promoting approaches to maintaining and sustaining nurses’ health are therefore essential. The aim of this study was to explore and thereby gain a deeper understanding of how nurses in Nepal’s hospitals experience their everyday work, with a focus on promoting and sustaining their work-related health.

Methods:

A qualitative design with semi-structured individual interviews were used. Nineteen registered nurses working at hospitals in Kathmandu Valley, Nepal, were individually interviewed between October 6 and December 5, 2018. Transcribed interviews were analyzed through thematic analysis.

Results:

Four main themes with belonging eight subthemes were constructed from the analysis: (1) “Sense of mean‑ingfulness and belongingness in work culture” with subthemes; “Open environment” and “Sharing attitude and coop‑erating for the entire team” (2) “Support and rewards from the management team” with subthemes; “Lacking manage‑rial support” and “Fair evaluation and job promotion opportunities”(3) “Workload and protection against work-related hazards” with subthemes; “Stressful and multitasking in workload” and “Lacking equipment for own health and caring”, and (4) “Motivation through opportunities and activities” with subthemes; “Employment benefts that motivate work”, and “Activities outside of work needed to recover”. These main themes and subthemes described nurses’ facilitators for and barriers to their work environment and health.

Conclusion:

Our study highlighted nurses’ experiences with facilitators and barriers to their work-related health. Nurses’ work-related health was positively afected by support from colleagues, managers, and the organization. Conversely, less support from managers, lack of equipment, and unfair judgment were barriers to nurses’ work-related health. This study adds new knowledge about nurses’ work-related health from the context of Nepal. Hospital organi‑zations and nursing managers in similar cultural and healthcare settings can apply the results of our study to develop strategies to promote and sustain nurses’ health and prevent work-related illness.