Integrated Management of Chronically ill Patients: Nurse-client interactions and follow-up care

Abstract

Follow-up care ensurescontinuity of client care, gives room for provider-client interactions and sustains self-management measures in the client with chronic illness. This study examined nurse-client interactions and follow-up care in integrated management of the chronically ill patient. 240 nurses were selected from secondary and tertiary health institutions in Anambra State of Nigeria using purposive sampling technique. Two research questions and two null hypotheses guided the study. The instrument used for data collection was questionnaire on nursing interventions in integrated management of chronically ill patients. Standard descriptive statistics was used to summarize the variables. Mean scores were used to answer the research questions while chi-square test was adopted in testing the hypotheses at 0.01 level of significance. The result indicated high level of nurse-client interaction (mean = 3.1368) but average level of follow-up care (mean =2.1556) of clients by nurses. Client's medical diagnosis was observed to have significant influence on nurseclient interaction; also nurse-client interactions was found to differ significantly across the levels of health care institutions.