• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.20 no.12
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• pp.493-501
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• 2019

This paper describes nurses' perceptions toward parental participation in pediatric intensive care units (PICU). Qualitative data were collected from five nurses working at two PICUs in Seoul through individual in-depth interviews. The interviews were conducted from January to February 2016 and analyzed using traditional content analysis. Five categories were found for the parent participation in PICU: needs, attributes, benefits, barriers, and facilitating strategies for parent participation in PICU. Nurses acknowledged the necessities and benefits of parent participation, particularly in PICU, considering the parents' emotional burdens due to the critical health condition of their child as well as the limited visiting policy. The major barriers were a lack of knowledge and the skills of nurses to facilitate parent participation, nurses' heavy workloads, and lack of policies and guidelines supporting parent participation within the PICUs and hospitals. The participants indicated that organizational facilitating-strategies, such as education for nurses about meaning and skills of parent participation in PICU, raising awareness for nurses as well as parents, and ensuring professional staff dedicated to promoting parent participation, to be significant factors. Further study will be needed to develop nursing interventions to integrate parent participation in PICU care.

• Journal of Korean Critical Care Nursing
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.12-24
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• 2024

Purpose : This study aimed to identify factors influencing the quality of life of family caregivers of intensive care unit (ICU) patients. Methods : We conducted a study using a cross-sectional design. The study involved 109 family caregivers of ICU patients at a university-affiliated hospital in Gyeonggi-do, South Korea. Data were collected through self-report questionnaires between July 2020 and April 2021 and analyzed using descriptive statistics, independent t-tests, one-way ANOVA, Pearson's correlation coefficients, and multiple regression analysis. Results : The study revealed significant differences in quality of life based on economic status (F=11.63, p<.001), cohabitation with patients (t=-2.04, p=.044), sleep duration after patient's admission to the ICU (t=-2.48, p =.025), and subjective health status (F=30.06, p<.001). There were significant negative correlations observed between quality of life and post-traumatic stress symptoms (r=-.38, p<.001) as well as caregiver burden (r=-.46, p<.001). Factors affecting quality of life were subjective health status, economic status, and caregiver burden (adj. R²=0.52, F=15.64, p<.001). Conclusion : These findings underscore the need to develop and implement intervention programs tailored to the health conditions and economic status of family caregivers, with a focus on alleviating caregiver burden. Such initiatives are essential to ultimately improve the quality of life for family caregivers of ICU patients.

• Journal of Korean Critical Care Nursing
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.1-10
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• 2018

Purpose : This study aimed to develop an in-depth and comprehensive understanding of the experiences of critical care nurses caring for dying patients. Method : Eleven critical care nurses with experience in caring for dying patients were recruited from four tertiary hospitals. Semi-structured face-to-face interviews were conducted between November 2016 and March 2017. The transcribed data were analyzed using qualitative content analysis to identify major themes and sub-themes that represented the experiences of critical care nurses. Results : The following six themes, and twelve sub-themes, were identified: (1) the gap between expectation and reality, (2) a distorted meaning of death, (3) repeated emotional pain and stress, (4) finding a solution alone, (5) sublimation into mission and calling, and (6) integration into one's own life. Conclusion : This study found that critical care nurses experience various psychological difficulties while caring for dying patients, and they made efforts on their own to overcome them. These findings are expected to inform the development of specialized programs to support critical care nurses to tackle these challenges, create guidelines on caring for dying patients, and help promote death education.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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• v.49 no.4
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• pp.423-436
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• 2019

Purpose: The aim of the study was to explore nurses' experience of person-centered relational care in the context of critical care. Methods: Key interview questions were developed based on the human-to-human relationship model suggested by Travelbee. Data were collected through indepth interviews with a purposive sample of 11 nurses having more than 2 years of working experience in intensive care units. An interpretative phenomenological analysis was conducted to analyze the data. Results: Four super-ordinate and nine sub-ordinate themes were identified. Emerged super-ordinate themes were as follows: (1) encountering a live person via patient monitoring systems; (2) deep empathic connection; (3) humanistic and compassionate care, and (4) accompanying the journey to the end. Study findings revealed that nurses in intensive care units experienced 'balancing emotions' and 'authenticity' in caring when entering human-to-human relationships with dying patients. The phenomenon of person-centered relational care in intensive care units was found to subsume intrinsic attributes of empathy, compassion, and trust, similar to the central concepts of Travelbee's theory. Conclusion: The interpretative findings in this study provide deeper understanding of Travelbee's human-to-human relationship model. The technological environment in intensive care units did not hinder experienced nurses from forming human-to-human relationships. These themes need to be emphasized in critical care nursing education as well as in nursing management. The results of this study will contribute to understanding nurse-patient caring relationships in depth, and help improve the quality of nursing care in intensive care units.

• Journal of Music and Human Behavior
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.17-39
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• 2017

This study aimed to review Korean-written and English-written studies on music interventions for family caregivers of patients in medical settings. Electronic databases were searched for studies published through 2016, using the keywords of music intervention, family caregivers, and specified settings. A total of 43 studies, five Korean-written and 38 English-written studies, were selected. The results showed that caregivers were the sole participants in five studies (family-only), and caregivers and patients co-participated in 38 studies (family-patient). While diversified types of family participation were included in the English-written studies dating back to the late 1980s, the Korean-written studies were the only ones to include patients as co-participants with their caregivers. Studies with family-only participation tended to be conducted in palliative care units and usually included the spouses of the patients. Meanwhile, studies with family-patient participation tended to be conducted in NICU or cancer units and usually included the parents of the patients. Furthermore, studies with family-only participation tended to apply passive music activities, and those with family-patient participation tended to use active music activities. The results of this study present baseline data on how family-centered care can be included in music interventions in medical settings in Korea, suggesting future studies to systematically analyze music interventions for family caregivers in terms of diversified patient- and caregiver-related factors.