Resumen de Advance care directives for treatment and mursing assistance. An empirical inquiry into decision making approaches
E. Bassi, A.M. Bonfadini, V. Daloiso, A.G. Spagnolo
This paper reports empirical research on how the nursing care profession perceives advance care/treatment directives, the degree to which they affect nursing care planning and how such documents might evolve in the future. The study also examines training in the use of advance directives, the perceptions of nurses with regard to such documents and questions of professional ethics that may undergo change in the future. Of the 64 nurses contacted, 32 agreed to take part in the study. The questionnaire, formulated es- pecially for the research objectives, yielded results showing that nurses are favorably inclined to adhere to such directives, insofar as these documents are perceived as helpful for both the patient and the health care worker during the terminal phase of illness.Moreover, results show that in order to enhance the weight of ad- vance directives in nursing care planning and delivery, nurses shall require more, in-depth training in the areas of clinical ethics and fo- rensic medicine. The survey also reveals the importance of collabo- rative teamwork in order to achieve nursing care planning that takes into account the wishes of the patient. The role of the nurse as educator, helping the patient draft the advance care/treatment directives, is also addressed.
