2017 Volume 20 Issue 2 Pages 53-62
In Japan’s current outpatient care system, outpatient nurses are not tasked with providing consultations regarding care to patients with chronic diseases. To change this situation, the present study aimed to identify the mindset required by highly-specialized outpatient nurses that care for patients with chronic diseases who require proactive support on a continuous basis, and to obtain suggestions for the support provided by general outpatient nurses. We conducted semi-structured interviews with three nurses who are nursing specialists with practical experience in providing outpatient primary care, and performed qualitative descriptive analysis on their responses. As a result, we identified 12 categories and 47 subcategories. We also identified six core categories wherein “Having the resolve to continue supporting patients throughout their life” was fundamental to “Supporting patients in a manner that made them believe that their treatment was worthwhile”, “Consciously going against conventional practice to become involved in patients’ personal lives”, “Providing special attention to patients who are considering discontinuing their treatment”, “Providing support based on the patient’s overall ability”, and “Making decisions after confirming the patient’s condition, particularly on non-treatment days”. In accordance with these findings, we obtained suggestions for improving support provided by general outpatient nurses that care for patients with chronic diseases who require proactive support on a continuous basis.
