The Balance of Fluids as a Nursing Problem

Basic theoretical background: The thesis deals with fluids, micturition, factors affecting micturition, diuresis as medical term, changes in quality of miction, disorders of passing urine, observation of quality of urine, fluid balance not only as a term, but also options and principles of collecting urine and recording and evaluating of fluid balance. Incontinence, involuntary passing urine, belong to the best known disorders of urine excretion. This problem causes very unpleasant fefling, affecting mainly psyche very much. Incontinence is not an illness, but symptom, which may be caused by more reasons. Imporatnt part od monitoring of fluid balance is also evaluation of its qualities. Colour quantity, odour and other qualities may be meaningful. All the abnormal qualities must be reported to the doctor immediately. Monitoring of fluid balance is part of nursing care. Results of proper monitoring of fluid balance is valuable indicator for doctors as well as nurses. Very important is to take into account all the ways of intake and output of fluids. In cases, where monitoring of diuresis is not infallible, checking the clients weight periodically might be chosen instead. Evaluation of fluid balance is carried out in time defined by doctor. The thesis also deals with errors and mistakes in urine collection and nursing process of emptying of urine container. Main aim of the thesis: The primary aim of this thesis is to map, how nurses monitor fluid balance. There is one hypothesis established: Nurses wih academic education instruct clients about monitoring fluid balance more properly than nurses wih secondary school education. There are two research questions established. Do the nurses instruct clients about monitoring fluid balance? Do they monitor the fluid balance properly? How do they write down the results? What are the most common mistakes in this area? Methodology: There was used the method of hidden observation of the nurses and observation sheet There were also used anonymous questionnaires, so there was no preessure put no respondents. The questionnaire consisted of 17 questions including 3 multiple choice