ORIGINAL ARTICLE How Healthcare Providers Manage Intensive Care Patients ’ Stressors?

Background: This manuscript reports the qualitative findings of a mixed methods research study conducted in December.2012. This manuscript focus on describing how health care providers managed their patient’s stress-ors in the intensive care units (ICU). Approximately 4.4 million patients require intensive care unit (ICU) treat-ment annually in the United States (National Quality Measures Clearing House, 2012).No specific protocol is present to guide the health care providers in managing their ICU patients ' stressors. There is a need to investi-gate how health care providers manage their patients stress. Methods: Mixed methods research design was used. Phenomenological approach was used for the qualitative section. The sample included 70 ICU health care providers. The researcher developed a paper based tool that asked participants about their demographic data, and asked open ended questions investigated how health care providers managed their patient's stressors. Consent forms were signed voluntarily by all participants; all ethical considerations were guaranteed in this study. This study was conducted in one of the large hospitals in southern California that have 46 ICU beds Results: Health care providers reported that they manage their ICU patient's stressors by implementing four themes of practice: Communication, pain management, encouraging the presence of family, and environmental control. Those were the major strategies in health care providers ' management of patients ' stressors