Pressure ulcers: Nurses knowledge, attitude and the practice

Background: A health damage that has been specifically related to nursing is pressure ulcers. Pressure ulcers are a complication caused by disease, care and treatment and can result in great suffering for the patient. Pressure ulcers can affect people both physically and psychosocially and is experienced, by most patients, as a serious and unnecessary complication of care. Today there are hundreds of identified risk factors for pressure ulcers described that can be divided into patient and care-related risk factors. A successful pressure ulcer prevention and treatment is to reduce or eliminate the underlying causes for the development of pressure ulcers, prevent deterioration and to treat existing ulcers. To prevent the occurrence of pressure ulcers and heal them, nurses’ knowledge and skills become important. Aim: The aim was to describe the nurses´ knowledge and attitude towards pressure ulcer prevention and treatment and how it affects the practice. Methods: The study was conducted as a literature study and was based on Willman, Stoltz och Bahtsevani (2011) methodology for reviewing scientific articles. 12 articles were chosen, three of which were qualitative, eight quantitative and one quantitative and qualitative. The analyze was conducted by Fribergs (2012) analysis regarding qualitative and quantitative research. Results: The result are presented under the four headings: Differences in nurses’ knowledge, Either you love pressure ulcers or you hate them, Lack of access to training, despite its positive impact, The attitude has a greater impact on the practice than knowledge. Discussions: The results were discussed based on the concept of health care environment, where the focus was directed towards a psychosocial component. Areas addressed include lack of access to education on pressure ulcers and what it can lead to, how the nurses’ negative attitude affect the practice and finally discussed the need to further examine of how nurses' attitudes can be improved and how they can be inspired to a greater interest in their work with pressure ulcers. Keywords: Pressure ulcer, Nurse, Prevention, Treatment, Knowledge, Attitude, Practice, Patient safety, Health care environmen