A COMPARISON OF PATIENT AND NURSE PERCEPTIONS OF PATIENTS' SELF-CARE DEFICITS ASSOCIATED WITH CANCER CHEMOTHERAPY.
Contributors: University of Alabama at Birmingham.
Published: 1983
Number of pages: 143
Subjects: Health Sciences, Nursing.; Health Sciences, Oncology.
Description: Self-care concepts (Orem, 1980), perceptual theory of behavior (Combs & Snygg, 1959), and the assumptions of constructivist methodology (Magoon, 1977) were interrelated as a framework for this study to ascertain if there was a difference between patient and nurse perceptions of patients' self-care deficits associated with cancer chemotherapy. A comparative descriptive survey design was used to address the major problem and sub-problems that related to patient variables of gender, race, and age; medical variables of cancer site, number of chemotherapeutic agents, and number of chemotherapy treatments; and procedural variables of week of interview and interval between patient-nurse contact and nurse interview.

Using a convenience sample of 30 adult patients and 5 registered nurses in a hematology-oncology clinic, 30 paired open-ended interviews were conducted to elicit patients' and nurses' perceptions of patients' self-care deficits associated with cancer chemotherapy. Subjects' verbatim reports of self-care deficits were independently classified, by the investigator and three content experts, using the categories of universal self-care requisites. Null hypotheses regarding differences between patients' and nurses' perceptions were tested through use of the chi-square goodness-of-fit test.

Subject reported 146 self-care deficits of which 122 were classified; 75 were from patients and 47 were from nurses. For overall number of classified responses there was a significant difference between patient and nurse perceptions of patients' self-care deficits associated with cancer chemotherapy. Significant differences were also found for (a) the category of activity and rest, (b) female patients, (c) white patients, (d) patients who received two chemotherapeutic agents, (e) interviews conducted during the first week of the study, and (f) nurse interviews conducted within 1 hour of the patient-nurse contact.

The findings indicated that nurses did not perceive the extent to which patients required assistance to maintain a balance between activity and rest. For patients who received two drugs, the type of drugs in the regimen possibly contributed to the disparity between patients' and nurses' perceptions. Findings also indicated that nurses became sensitized to the research methodology.
Notes: Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 45-03, Section: B, page: 0827.

Thesis (D.S.N.)--UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA AT BIRMINGHAM, 1983.

School code: 0005.