Nurses' perceptions of parental needs during their child's hospitalisation

Abstract

This study aimed to explore the nurses' perceptions of parental needs during their child's hospitalisation in a Maltese state general hospital. The objectives of this study were to explore the nurses' view on the needs of parents of hospitalised children, to determine how important these needs are perceived, and to describe the extent to which nurses feel that these needs are being met. To try and eliminate sampling bias all 35 nurses working in the medical and surgical paediatric wards in the hospital were included in the sample. Data was collected through the administration of a 10-15 minute self-administered questionnaire which consisted of 48 statements that had 2 scoring systems using 1-5 Likert scales. One score was for assessing the importance of the statements and the other to asses how well these statements are being fulfilled. Data collection was distributed over 2 months and yielded a response rate of 69%. Data were analysed by the help of Microsoft access and Microsoft excel. Tables and graphs were used to facilitate analysis. Findings showed that even though the nurses are aware of the needs of parents, they are also aware that not enough is being done to help them fulfil these needs. This is shown by the fact that even though the statements are generally ranked as very highly important, when it comes to ranking fulfilment the statements are sadly ranked quite low. The need that was identified as being the most important was the need to trust the nurse. This finding is m accordance with what was found in other studies in other countries. A salient finding is that none of the participants hold a Master's degree. While this may be expected from recently qualified staff, some of the more experienced staff might need to be encouraged to further their education. Furthermore, nurses might need additional training to be able to help parents meet their needs while their child is in hospital. This study can in no way be thought to be exhaustive of the subject under study implying that further research needs to be done in this regard; in particular the needs of children need to be studied as these need to be addressed before any attempt is made to address the needs of parents. An exploration of how to enhance the child and family's hospital stay may need to focus on the hospital facilities for rooming in for the parents which nurses identified as still sadly lacking.