The Perceptions of Nurses and Nursing Students Regarding Family Involvement in the Care of Hospitalized Adult Patients

Abstract

Over the past few decades, there have been concerns regarding the humanization of healthcare and the involvement of family members in patients’ hospital care. The attitudes of hospitals toward welcoming families in this respect have improved. In Arab culture, the main core of society is considered to be the family, not the individual. The objective behind involving family in patient care is to meet patients’ support needs. Consequently, this involvement affects nurses and their attitudes toward the importance of family involvement in patient care. Objectives: To describe nurses’ and nursing students’ perceptions of family involvement in the care of hospitalized adult patients in Saudi Arabia. Design: This study used a quantitative descriptive cross-sectional design. The data were collected using a convenience sampling survey via social media. Results: A total of 270 participants (staff and students) took part in this study, including 232 (85.9%) females and 38 (14.1%) males. Moreover, a high percentage of participants (78.8%) acknowledged that family presence strongly affected the improvement of the patient’s condition. However, 69.3% of participants thought that involving family members during special care processes or cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) would be traumatizing for these individuals. Moreover, there was a significant diffidence between the attitudes of the nurses and nursing students toward family involvement and the number of years of employment (F = 3.60, p < 0.05). On the contrary, there were insignificant differences between the attitudes of the nurses and nursing students toward family involvement and their gender, nationality, age, education level, and years of work experience in Saudi Arabia (p > 0.05). Furthermore, the regression analysis showed a significant negative correlation between nurses’ years of employment and their support of family involvement in patient care (ß = −0.20, SE = 0.08, t = −2.70, p = 0.01). Conclusions: Nurses with more experience showed no support for family involvement in patient care. We have to consider the clinical barriers that affect nurses’ support for family involvement in patient-centered care, such as hospital polices, guidelines, and the model used for family-centered care integration in the hospital system to facilitate the interaction between healthcare providers and family members.

The Effect of Simulation Training on Enhancing Nursing Students' Perceptions to Incorporate Patients' Families Into Treatment Plans: A Randomized Experimental Study

“…Involving family members in the medical care of patients is often preferred by patients themselves, as family members can provide valuable information about the patient's functioning at home and support treatment compliance. However, Shibily et al [ 33 ] conducted a study on nurses and nursing students and found that nurses with more years of experience showed less support for family involvement in patient care. This negative correlation may be attributed to the time constraints experienced by senior nurses who are expected to multitask.…”

Student Engagement Increases Caring Behaviour of Nursing Students

“…This finding also confirmed that technical caring behaviour was more perceived among students than the psychosocial caring behaviour. Despite that, the presence of patient's families allows patients to know information about their status and improve patients' condition as well as improve communication between nurses and families and increase trust in treatments provided to patients (Shibily, 2021). Furthermore, a family was a source of bonding feelings which bridge patients and nurses in talking care of patients which in turn could increase nursing job satisfaction (Hagedom, 2021).…”

Family Visiting Restrictions and Postoperative Clinical Outcomes: A Retrospective Analysis

“…In recent decades, the practice of health professionals has embodied the principles of PFCC and FCC to the point that nurses recognise that the presence of FRs at the bedside has a considerable influence on improving the condition of patients [ 4 ]. Hospital policies that allow the presence of FRs have been largely implemented showing their effectiveness among patients with dementia [ 5 ], cancer [ 6 ], cardiovascular diseases [ 7 ], and among frail elderlies [ 8 ].…”