The challenges in caring for morbidly obese patients in Intensive Care: A focused ethnographic study

Abstract

Bariatric care pathways need to be developed that use more suitable body measurements to inform the use of bariatric equipment. Intensive care staff need to engage in debate about what is acceptable, respectful, and appropriate language in the delivery of bariatric patient care.

Intensive care nurses’ experiences of caring for obese intensive care patients: A hermeneutic study

“…Providing satisfactory care became difficult because of challenges in relation to the patients’ weight and the risk of complications. Hales, Coombs, and de Vries () also revealed that ICU staff found it physically challenging caring for morbidly obese patients. They revealed that special equipment was designed based on weight and not body shape, which resulted in difficulties in the care situations (Hales et al., ).…”

“…Hales, Coombs, and de Vries () also revealed that ICU staff found it physically challenging caring for morbidly obese patients. They revealed that special equipment was designed based on weight and not body shape, which resulted in difficulties in the care situations (Hales et al., ). In the present study, physically demanding work caused nurses to worry for their own safety, and, as such, be “unwilling” to provide care.…”

Obesity and emergency care in the French CONSTANCES cohort

“…Among them, urgent procedures could be more difficult to achieve (resuscitation maneuvers, intubation, drip insertion), clinical signs could be shaded, treatments’ dosages must be adapted correctly and imaging strategies are different (less relevance or success of ultrasonography) [ 16 – 20 ]. There are also logistical difficulties because of inadequate material (limited access to bariatric chairs or beds) and obese patients need more staff for nursing procedures which are longer than for normal-weight patients [ 21 ]. Finally, the complexity of these situations seems to increase with the obesity’s severity.…”

Blending the Focused Ethnographic Method and Case Study Research: Implications Regarding Case Selection and Generalization of Results

“…In the anthropology of health and nutrition (e.g., Lee et al 2019;Thuita et al 2018), specific social, economic, and cultural factors affecting illnesses and nutrition in different cultural contexts have been identified to design more effective interventions (see G. H. Pelto [2017] for a review). In health care research (e.g., Bikker et al 2017;Hales et al 2018;Higginbottom et al 2013;Muecke 1994;Wall 2015), it has been shown that people from various cultures, subcultures, and groups integrate health beliefs and practices into their lives differently, and the social and cultural factors shaping health-care use and delivery have been identified (see Cruz and Higginbottom [2013] and Vindrola-Padros and Vindrola-Padros [2018] for reviews). Finally, in workplace studies, it has been shown that technological work systems are inseparable from the workers' local knowledge and reasoning, which produce the work actions and activities and make them understandable (see Luff et al [2000:xii-xvi] for a review).…”