2025 Volume 3 Article ID: 2024-009
A patient with bladder cancer and associated with severe pain due to bony metastasis and lumbar canal stenosis was admitted to a hospital for pain relief. After cardiac arrest occurred in the hospital, the patient developed a persistent disturbance of consciousness. As a primary nurse, the author provided care to family members who were shocked by the sudden development of a disturbance of consciousness.
The author made efforts to precisely inform the current state of the patient as much as possible, in addition to providing adjusted details of informed consent. To decrease the anxiety of the family, the author continued to listen to the worries of the family members attentively and regularly informed the family members regarding the patient’s medical state and appearance so that the family members could gradually come to accept the medical state of the patient. As a result, the family members finally were able to come to terms with their worries and consternation and finally accept the patient’s situation. Based on Fink’s crisis theory, which suggests the proper course taken by patients and their families who are shocked by a sudden change in a patient’s medical state, the changes in the attitudes of the family members in our case were examined.
Nurses should try to establish an environment where the family members can take sufficient time to communicate with the patients, express their thoughts, and thereby obtain a sense of relief, when worrying about a family member who is a patient in a crisis situation.
