2016 Volume 25 Issue 1 Pages 65-75
The study aimed to determine the amount of nursing care time allotted to outpatients with mental illness to aid continuous community living, and analyze its relation to the difference in Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF) scores of the patients. Data were collected from 16 nurses from a psychiatric outpatient department regarding their nursing care workload devoted to enable outpatients to continue community living. The nurses recorded the care time, the kind of care, and characteristics of outpatients in 195 cases. The average investigation time was 41.7 hours (SD=13.3). The average GAF score was 59.7. The results showed no difference in the amount of nursing care time for outpatients with a high GAF score and those with a low GAF score. However, in case of outpatients with a low GAF score, nurses spend more time in care aimed at helping the patients achieve mental control than other.
