The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has affected all aspects of individuals’ lives and behaviors, including the behaviors of nurses. Specifically, the pandemic has impacted the way that nurses treat older adults and has led to the spread of ageism among nurses. This study was conducted using self-report tools on 163 nurses to examine the problem of ageism amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The results suggest that critical care nurses have higher levels of death anxiety and ageism in comparison to medical/surgical nurses. After controlling for the work department, low levels of symbolic immortality were associated with high levels of ageism and death anxiety among nurses. These results might provide an insight into the development of a psychological intervention to reduce nurses’ death anxiety and ageism toward older adults.
<b><i>Introduction:</i></b> Pain is still under-recognized and undertreated among intensive care unit (ICU) patients, such as those being intubated or with dementia, cognitive impairments, or communication deficits due to inability to self-report. This study aimed to describe nurses’ pain assessment practices for cognitively intact and impaired older adult ICU patients. <b><i>Methods:</i></b> A descriptive correlational study of a convenience sample of 200 registered nurses was conducted in private, public, and university-affiliated hospitals in Irbid, Jordan. Descriptive statistics, such as mean, standard deviation, and frequency, were used to analyze the study data. <b><i>Results:</i></b> Statistically significant differences were found in the proportion of nurses who assessed and documented pain every 1–4 h in cognitively intact patients than those with cognitive impairment (<i>n</i> = 67, 63.21% vs. <i>n</i> = 39, 36.79%), <i>p</i> = 0.002, compared to the proportion of nurses who never assessed and document pain in cognitively impaired patients than those without cognitive impairment (<i>n</i> = 38, 76.0% vs. <i>n</i> = 12, 24%), <i>p</i> < 0.001. <b><i>Discussion/Conclusion:</i></b> Our study results showed that the majority of participant nurses felt that the use of pain assessment tools for cognitively intact and impaired older adult ICU patients to self-report is somewhat not at all important. This study also reported that nurses perceived themselves as the individuals who accurately rate the pain in cognitively intact patients, followed by the patients themselves.
Previous intervention studies have shown that branching simulation (BS) unfolds the complex multidimensional aspects of challenging health problems. The present study aimed to examine graduate nursing students’ perceptions of using BS in professional training. This study used a qualitative descriptive design with semi-structured interviews with a sample of 20 graduate nursing students. Four main themes emerged from the results: (a) BS as a support to students’ professional training, (b) BS leads to changes in clinical practice, (c) whether BS is a stressful learning experience, and (d) BS versus traditional lecturing. The participating students perceived BS as a valid learning tool that enables them to improve their critical thinking and decision-making skills, self-confidence, practical and theoretical preparation, and multidisciplinary teamwork and collaboration. Despite the identified advantages of BS, future research is needed to examine the effectiveness of incorporating BS in nursing practice.
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