The hardiness of hospice nurses

Hardiness is a developing concept of particular relevance and interest to nursing. Hardiness is defined as a personality construct that is an amalgam of three main elements: control, challenge and commitment. Kobasa asserts that an investment of committed energy serves to strengthen a person under stress or when faced with challenges. Hospice nurses confront a myriad of challenges associated with the rapidly changing needs of dying people and their friends and families. This author suggests that the very nature of palliative care requires mobilization of the same three constituents of hardiness, i.e., control, challenge, and commitment, blended with the key hospice elements of critical competence and compassionate care. This article considers a possible relationship between hardiness and hospice nurses, suggesting that not only are hospice nurses hardy, but that the very practice and philosophy of palliative care is predicated on a triad of control, challenge, and commitment harnessed in concert for the delivery of skilled, compassionate care to dying persons.