The confused patient: nurses' knowledge and interventions

The purpose of this study was to identify nurses' knowledge and experience about confusion and its treatment. A random sample of hospital-based, medical-surgical registered nurses (N = 100) was surveyed about their contact with confused patients and their knowledge about confusion. The findings suggest that nurses have regular and frequent contact with confused patients, caring for approximately three such patients in a week. They believe they are knowledgeable about confusion, rating their own knowledge on average as 2.96 on a scale ranging from 0 to 4. Restraint is the major treatment used for confusion, with 84% of the nurses reporting that the last confused patient they cared for was restrained. The high incidence data for use of restraints raise questions about what is a necessary restraint and whether restraints are overused in hospital settings. More attention needs to be directed toward finding alternatives to the use of restraints in the acute care hospital.