Palliative care at home: Stress for nurses in urban and rural New South Wales, Australia

Nurses often experience positive and negative dimensions of caring for dying clients and their families. This project aimed to compare stress experienced by urban and rural community nurses working with palliative‐care clients in the home. Participants included five nurses working in rural Australia...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:International journal of nursing practice 2001-10, Vol.7 (5), p.306-313
Main Authors: Wilkes, Lesley M, Beale, Barbara
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Anesthesia. Intensive care medicine. Transfusions. Cell therapy and gene therapy
Australia
Biological and medical sciences
Clinical death. Palliative care. Organ gift and preservation
Community nurses
Home care
Home Care Services - organization & administration
Humans
Medical sciences
New South Wales
nurses
Nurses - psychology
Nursing
Occupational stress
Palliative Care
rural
Rural Population
Rural-Urban differences
stress
Stress, Psychological
Terminally ill people
Tropical medicine
urban
Urban Population
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Summary:Nurses often experience positive and negative dimensions of caring for dying clients and their families. This project aimed to compare stress experienced by urban and rural community nurses working with palliative‐care clients in the home. Participants included five nurses working in rural Australia and seven nurses working in an urban area. Transcribed data from unstructured audio‐taped interviews were coded for common and contrasting themes, and a comparison was made of the stress experienced by the two groups of nurses. The major themes were role conflict and definition, family dynamics, time and workload. For both groups of nurses, the impact of family relationships and role conflict within the community impacted significantly to the stress they experienced. Debriefing opportunities for nurses to discuss stress, including educational and support sessions, is an essential component of best practice. Rural nurses had the additional stress of trying to provide a 24 h service over vast distances with a lack of financial resources.
ISSN:1322-7114
1440-172X
DOI:10.1046/j.1440-172X.2001.00267.x