Promoting and Supporting the health needs of asylum seekers and refugees in Finland

There has been a global increase in recent years, especially in Finland since 2014, in the number of people needing asylum. Due to this mass migration, nurses will need more guidance in the health care of asylum seekers and refugees in Finland. The purpose of this study was to first establish the most common health problems of asylum seekers and refugees and then investigate what kind of nursing practices can benefit health care professionals in Finland when caring for this vulnerable group. An integrative literature review was carried out using nine articles selected from the databases CINAHL, PubMed and MEDLINE. The selected articles were analysed using the principles of the inductive content analysis method. The results yielded were compiled into two main headings depending on which research question they answered. Then subheadings were compiled. The common health problems were found to be mental illnesses, chronic illnesses, gynaecological and reproductive needs, lack of preventative health, abuse and other contributary factors affecting health such as living standards or poverty. The nursing practices found to be beneficial were; improvement of communication and interpretation, specialist training for nurses, techniques to improve cultural competence, giving support to each other and collaborative multidisciplinary teamwork, increased preventative health measures and screening. These findings can be used by healthcare professionals to develop and implement interventions that can guide nursing practice in order to improve nurses’ knowledge and skills therefore enhancing the quality of health care for asylum seekers and refugees living in Finland