Abstract
Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine the results of a national self-evaluation survey of nurses working at home care nursing stations using 483 quality indicators (QIs) covering 16 domains of home healthcare nursing. We have developed these QIs for quality assurance of home care nursing for older adults in Japan.
Method: We sent 10,644 questionnaires to nurses working at 5,322 home care nursing stations in Japan. In this survey we asked the nurses to evaluate their daily practices based on the QIs and to provide suggestions for improving the QIs.
Results: Altogether 3,068 (29.7%) nurses responded. The response showed that on average over 70% of QIs from all 16 areas were considered to be practiced in the nurses' daily work. The QIs in the areas of “assisting eating/dysphasia” and “oral hygiene” showed low practice rates, while the QIs in “assisting bathing/cleansing” showed high practice rates. The QIs with high practice rates were mainly related to information gathering, emotional support, or reporting to the physician. They required minimum physical/emotional invasion and were common in hospital nursing. The QIs with the following characteristics tended to show low practice rates: assessments that require high-level judgment, interventions with skills that require specialized learning, or evaluation of provided care. In all areas, over 70% of nurses were affirmative of the QIs stating that the QIs covered major aspects of home care nursing for older adults.
Conclusion: It was found that there was a certain variety in the practice rate in these QIs. We would like to continue our efforts to develop QIs for home care nursing for older adults in Japan.
