İlknur Kahriman

The Effect of Empathy Training on the Empathic Skills of Nurses.

Background The profound impact of empathy training on quality nursing care has been recognized. Studies have shown that there has been little improvement in nurses’ communication skills, and that they should work to enhance this area. Relevant training will lead to an improvement in nurses’ empathic skills, which in turn, will enable them to understand their patients better, establish positive interpersonal relationships with them, and boost their professional satisfaction. Objectives To reveal the effect of empathy training on the empathic skills of nurses. Patients and Methods This study was conducted as an experimental design. The research sample consisted of 48 nurses working at the pediatric clinics of Farabi hospital of Karadeniz Technical University in Turkey (N = 83). Two groups, an experimental group (group 1) and a control group (group 2) were determined after questionnaires were supplied to all nurses in the study sample. At first, it was intended to select these groups using a random method. However, since this may have meant that the experimental and control groups were formed from nurses working in the same service, the two groups were selected from different services to avoid possible interaction between them. The nurses in the Group 1 were provided with empathy training through group and creative drama techniques. Pre-tests and post-tests were conducted on both groups. Data was collected via a questionnaire designed around the topic “empathic skill scale-ESS”, developed by Dokmen. The Kolmogorov Smirnov test was employed to assess whether the measurable data was suitable for normal distribution. Data was presented as numbers and percentage distributions, as mean ± standard deviation and Chi-square, and as student t tests and paired t tests. The level of significance was accepted as P < 0.05. Results The nurses in the experimental group had a mean score of 146.7 ± 38.8 and 169.5 ± 22.1 in the ESS pre-test and post-test, respectively. Although the nurses in the control group had a pre-test mean score of 133.7 ± 37.1, which increased to 135.1 ± 51.7 after the training, no statistically significant difference was found (P = 0.886). A comparison of the groups indicated that they scored similarly in the pre-test. However, the experimental group scored significantly higher than the control group in the post-test (P = 0.270 and P = 0.015, respectively). Conclusions In the light of these findings, it is recommended that communication skills should be widely included in in-service training programs; similar studies should be conducted on broader control groups formed through randomization; and a comparison should be made between the findings.

Evaluating medical errors made by nurses during their diagnosis, treatment and care practices.

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES The aim of this study was to determine whether the nurses committed medical errors and to identify the types of and reasons for the medical errors. BACKGROUND Medical errors have recently emerged as a significant issue both in Turkey and around the world because they result in the death and disability of a number of people each year. DESIGN This study was a descriptive study. METHOD The study was conducted with 1092 nurses working at a university hospital, 12 public hospitals and a private hospital in Trabzon. RESULTS Twenty-two per cent of the nurses stated that they had made medical errors endangering patient safety, and 4% stated that their medical errors had injured a patient. Of the nurses who made a medical error, 10% indicated that a patients treatment was delayed and 6% stated that the patient experienced side effects. In addition, 23% of the nurses stated that they had committed medical errors such as delaying/not administering a patients treatment and 20% stated that they had made medical errors such as using instruments without first checking them. Eighty-three per cent of the nurses stated that they had committed a medical error due to fatigue, 82% were reported to be caused by the hospitals administration due to the limited number of nurses on duty and 75% were caused by physicians and other medical personnel due to a lack of communication. CONCLUSION Two of five nurses had committed a medical error throughout their career; these errors were due to fatigue, a limited number of nurses and communication problems, and patients were harmed because of these errors. RELEVANT TO CLINICAL PRACTICE The results of this study could be used to take precautions against nursing medical errors in Turkey and to enhance institutional policies and activities regarding medical errors and patient safety.