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Published on: July 4, 2018
Palliative care competencies of nurses in primary care
Pauli J Lamppu1, Pirita Forsius2, Teija Hammar2
1Wellbeing Services County of Keski-Uusimaa, Department of general practice and primary health care, University of Helsinki.
Background:
Competency in palliative care is necessary to support the adequate quality of care of patients.
Aim:
To describe the self-evaluated level of competence of clinical nursing staff and supervisors' evaluations of staff competence in non-specialist palliative care settings.
Methods:
A web-based questionnaire provided a cross-sectional nationwide sample of answers.
Findings:
A total of 587 answers were analysed. Clinical nurses rated their competence lowest in the themes of communication and advance care planning (ACP). ACP was among the lowest scoring themes for supervisors' evaluations of staff competence. Similarly, the highest scoring themes for both groups included the theme evaluating symptom care and assessment. In this theme, competencies related to psychological and existential suffering scored lowest.
Conclusion:
This study provides an overview of nurses' PC competencies and highlighted some of the weaknesses they recognise. These shortcomings include evaluating and treating psychological and existential suffering, legal aspects of decision making and competencies related to ACP.
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