Dataset Information

The meaning and importance of dignified care: findings from a survey of health and social care professionals.

ABSTRACT:

Background

There are well established national and local policies championing the need to provide dignity in care for older people. We have evidence as to what older people and their relatives understand by the term 'dignified care' but less insight into the perspectives of staff regarding their understanding of this key policy objective.

Methods

A survey of health and social care professionals across four NHS Trusts in England to investigate how dignified care for older people is understood and delivered. We received 192 questionnaires of the 650 distributed.

Results

Health and social care professionals described the meaning of dignified care in terms of their relationships with patients: 'respect' (47%), 'being treated as an individual' (40%), 'being involved in decision making' (26%) and 'privacy' (24%). 'Being treated as an individual' and 'maintaining privacy' were ranked as the most important components of dignified care. Physical caring tasks such as 'helping with washing, dressing and feeding' were rarely described as being part of dignified care and attributed much less importance than the relational components.

Conclusion

Dignity in care is a concept with multiple meanings. Older people and their relatives focus upon the importance of providing physical care when describing what this means to them. Our participants focussed upon the relational aspects of care delivery rather than care itself. Proactive measures are therefore required to ensure that the physical aspects of care are met for all older people receiving care in NHS trusts.

SUBMITTER: Cairns D

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3614439 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

The meaning and importance of dignified care: findings from a survey of health and social care professionals.

Cairns Deborah D Williams Veronika V Victor Christina C Richards Sally S Le May Andreé A Martin Wendy W Oliver David D

BMC geriatrics 20130322

<h4>Background</h4>There are well established national and local policies championing the need to provide dignity in care for older people. We have evidence as to what older people and their relatives understand by the term 'dignified care' but less insight into the perspectives of staff regarding their understanding of this key policy objective.<h4>Methods</h4>A survey of health and social care professionals across four NHS Trusts in England to investigate how dignified care for older people is ...[more]

PMID: 23517491

Similar Datasets

Project description:BACKGROUND:Noninvasive telemonitoring (TM) can be used in heart failure (HF) patients to perform early detection of decompensation at home, prevent unnecessary health care utilization, and decrease health care costs. However, the evidence is not sufficient to be part of HF guidelines for follow-up care, and we have no knowledge of how TM is used in the Nordic Baltic region. OBJECTIVE:The aim of this study was to describe health care professionals' (HCPs) perception of and presumed experience with noninvasive TM in daily HF patient care, perspectives of the relevance of and reasons for applying noninvasive TM, and barriers to the use of noninvasive TM. METHODS:A cross-sectional survey was performed between September and December 2016 in Norway and Lithuania with physicians and nurses treating HF patients at either a hospital ward or an outpatient clinic. A total of 784 questionnaires were sent nationwide by postal mail to 107 hospitals. The questionnaire consisted of 43 items with close- and open-ended questions. In Norway, the response rate was 68.7% (226/329), with 57 of 60 hospitals participating, whereas the response rate was 68.1% (310/455) in Lithuania, with 41 of 47 hospitals participating. Responses to the closed questions were analyzed using descriptive statistics, and the open-ended questions were analyzed using summative content analysis. RESULTS:This study showed that noninvasive TM is not part of the current daily clinical practice in Norway or Lithuania. A minority of HCPs responded to be familiar with noninvasive TM in HF care in Norway (48/226, 21.2%) and Lithuania (64/310, 20.6%). Approximately half of the HCPs in both countries perceived noninvasive TM to be relevant in follow-up of HF patients in Norway (131/226, 58.0%) and Lithuania (172/310, 55.5%). For physicians in both countries and nurses in Norway, the 3 most mentioned reasons for introducing noninvasive TM were to improve self-care, to reduce hospitalizations, and to provide high-quality care, whereas the Lithuanian nurses described ability to treat more patients and to reduce their workload as reasons for introducing noninvasive TM. The main barriers to implement noninvasive TM were lack of funding from health care authorities or the Territorial Patient Fund. Moreover, HCPs perceive that HF patients themselves could represent barriers because of their physical or mental condition in addition to a lack of internet access. CONCLUSIONS:HCPs in Norway and Lithuania are currently nonusers of TM in daily HF care. However, they perceive a future with TM to improve the quality of care for HF patients. Financial barriers and HF patients' condition may have an impact on the use of TM, whereas sufficient funding from health care authorities and improved knowledge may encourage the more widespread use of TM in the Nordic Baltic region and beyond.

Project description:Mistreatment with women during childbirth is prevalent in many in low- and middle-income countries. There is dearth of evidence that informs development of health system interventions to promote supportive and respectful maternity care in facility-based settings. We examined health systems bottlenecks that impedes provision of supportive and respectful maternity care in secondary-level public healthcare system of Pakistan. Using a qualitative exploratory design, forty in-depth interviews conducted with maternity care staff of six public health facilities in southern Pakistan. Development of interview guide and data analyses were guided by the WHO’s six health system building blocks. A combination of inductive and deductive approach was used for data analyses. Our study identified range of bottlenecks impeding provision of RMC. In terms of leadership/governance, there was lack of institutional guidelines, supervision and monitoring, and patient feedback mechanism. No systematic mechanism existed to screen and record patient psychosocial needs. Health workforce lacked training opportunities on RMC that resulted in limited knowledge and skills; there were also concerns about lack of recognition from leadership for good performers, and poor relationship and coordination between clinical and non-clinical staff. Regarding the domain of service delivery, we found that patients were perceived as un-cooperative, non-RMC manifestations were acceptable and normalized under certain conditions, and restrictive policies for active engagement of companions. Finally, lack of cleanliness, curtains for privacy, seating arrangement for companion were the identified issues infrastructural issues. A service-delivery intervention package is needed that effectively uses all six components of the health system: from investments in capacity building of maternity teams to creating a conducive facility environment via proper governance and accountability mechanisms. Such interventions should not only focus on provision of maternity care in a respectful and dignified manner, but also ensure that care is responsive to the psychosocial needs of pregnant women without any discrimination.

Dataset Information

The meaning and importance of dignified care: findings from a survey of health and social care professionals.

Background

Methods

Results

Conclusion

Publications

The meaning and importance of dignified care: findings from a survey of health and social care professionals.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets