The results have a number of practical applications for nursing, both for clinical practice and research. The results can be used in paediatric hospital wards caring for chronically ill children and their families. The five domains of family health promotion described here should be tested in other paediatric wards and in other geographical locations.
This paper explores the phenomena of family health from a nursing perspective by examining the view of health in the discipline of nursing, and the view of family health in multiple disciplines. A holistic definition of family health for nursing is proposed which includes five realms of family experience which make up the family health system. The proposed classification is offered as a beginning heuristic model to organize knowledge generation for use in the practice of family nursing.
The RPI stimulated double loop learning that changed paediatric critical care nurses' attitudes about family, enhanced their communication and ability to build trusting relationships with families and brought about a new appreciation of the uniqueness of family stress. There was a new integration of family care into the nurses' practice as a result of the intervention.
Specific techniques of role modelling and reflective practice are suggested as effective approaches to teach family sensitive care in clinical settings where families are part of the care environment.
It remains a challenge for intensive care nurses to humanize highly technological health care environments while simultaneously maintaining the benefits this technology can offer. Helping nurses to understand the parent perceptions of pediatric intensive care hospitalization may assist nurses with addressing the need to humanize the experience. This qualitative study describes parents' perceptions of nurses' caregiving behaviors in a Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) in the Midwestern United States. Mothers (n = 10) and fathers (n = 9) of 10 children were asked questions using a semistructured interview. Content analysis was used to analyze parents' verbal descriptions of nurses taking care of their child in a large midwestern metropolitan area PICU. Parents reported nurses engaged in nurturing and vigilant behavior, namely showing affection, caring, watching, and protecting. Parents' reports suggest that the best nursing behaviors are those that facilitate and complement critical aspects of the parental role, thus reinforcing family integrity during a time of turmoil and uncertainty. Incorporating this knowledge into practice contributes to nurses' understanding of PICU hospitalization as a family event, and also helps to inform interventions to improve family-centered care in the PICU.
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