As this issuehas not yet been addressed in Croatia, our aim was to explore the presence of the burnout syndrome in nurses and see how it is related to their perception of elder mistreatment in nursing homes and extended care units. The burnout syndrome was assessed in 171 nursing professionals with a standardised Maslach Burnout Inventory for Human Services Survey (MBI-HSS) for three dimensions: emotional exhaustion (EE), depersonalisation (DP), and personal accomplishment (PA). High EE was reported by 43.9 %, high DP by 22.2 %, and low PA by 39.8 % of the respondents. Their perception of elder abuse and neglect was investigated with two self-completion questionnaires. The answers suggest that elder mistreatment in Croatian nursing homes and extended care units is more common than expected: 55 % witnessed shouting at a resident in anger, 43 % insulting and swearing at a resident, 42 % force-feeding the resident, 39 % ignoring a resident when they called, and 38 % neglecting to turn or move a resident to prevent pressure sores. We also established associations between a number of questionnaire items on perceived abuse and neglect and the burnout syndrome dimensions and determined the items that predicted the type and level of burnout in our respondents. One way to avoid the pitfalls that lead to abuse and neglect is education in schools and at work. We believe our research could contribute to this end.
The innovative use of bibliometric analysis and mapping, together with thematic analysis, is a useful tool for analysis of research production in the field of nursing ethics. The results presented can be an excellent starting point for literature reviews and more exhaustive data, information and knowledge seeking.
Purpose
The aim of this paper was to present the results of the first study in which nursing research literature production was studied in the relation to country and health determinants.
Design
Bibliometric analysis was used.
Methods
The corpus of nursing publications was harvested from the Scopus indexing and abstracting database. Using research articles' metadata (funding acknowledgments, publication years, and author affiliations), we analyzed global trends in the nursing research literature production of funded and nonfunded publications. Next, we performed a regression analysis and correlation analysis relating nursing research productivity to health and country determinants.
Findings
The search resulted in 118,870 papers, among which 22.0% were funded (24.7% for G8 countries). Nursing literature production is exhibiting a positive trend. The United States is by far the most productive country in terms of funded and nonfunded literature production, although it is ranked only ninth in per capita production, for which Sweden is the most productive country regarding funded papers. The study also revealed that gross domestic product, human development factor, and gross national income were related to nursing research literature productivity.
Conclusions
The positive trend in nursing research literature production (both funded and nonfunded) reveals a growth in nursing research funding. Regionally centered research literature production shows that the more developed and “rich” countries produce the majority of publications. A positive correlation is evident between country determinants and research literature production, as is a positive correlation between per capita literature research production and well‐being and health determinants.
Clinical Relevance
Substantial growth in terms of nursing research literature production and research funding has been identified. While a limited amount of research in this area exists, this study revealed some interesting relations between nursing literature production and country and health determinants, which might motivate nursing researchers to pursue more intensive research and funders to support further growth of nursing research funding.
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the impact of self-care on the prevalence of loneliness among elderly people living in retirement homes and older people living in their homes/communities.
Design/methodology/approach
The research was conducted through standardized SELSA-L assessment loneliness questionnaires and the Self Care Assessment Worksheet for self-care assessment. The results were processed using the Kruskal–Wallis test.
Findings
The obtained results have shown that impaired self-care ability affects the prevalence of loneliness among the elderly almost the same in both groups of participants. However, regarding the relationship between the state of health and self-care, only a statistically significant difference in the prevalence of loneliness is found in the case of the participants living in their homes, with the worst health condition affecting the poorer psychological care.
Research limitations/implications
It is necessary to point out the limitations of the research, primarily sample limitations and the selected design of the study. The sample consisted of two different and relatively small groups of participants which could adversely affect the representativeness of the sample and reduce the possibility of generalising the results. The next limiting factor is the age distribution the authors used in the research, where the age of the participants as a very important variable was collected by age range and not precisely which consequently resulted in inequality in subgroup sizes. Thus, the middle age (75–85) covers up to ten years, which is a huge range at an older age and can mean major differences in functional ability, and can impact the self-care assessment.
Practical implications
Nurses are indispensable in care for the elderly and they need to promote and encourage self-care of the elderly through health care. Elderly people living in retirement homes should be allowed to participate equally in health care in order to preserve their own autonomy and dignity. However, to benefit those who live in their homes, nurses should be connected to the local community and thus stimulate various forms of preventative (testing blood sugar levels, blood pressure and educating on the importance of preventive examinations) or recreational activities in the environment of elderly people with the goal of preserving their functional abilities.
Originality/value
The impact of self-care on loneliness was not sufficiently researched, and this paper contributed to understanding the complexity of loneliness phenomena among the elderly with the aim of developing a model of prevention.
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