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Sleep in the intensive care unit – nurses' documentation and patients' perspectives
Author(s) -
RitmalaCastren Marita,
Axelin Anna,
Kiljunen Kaija,
Sainio Carita,
LeinoKilpi Helena
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
nursing in critical care
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.689
H-Index - 43
eISSN - 1478-5153
pISSN - 1362-1017
DOI - 10.1111/nicc.12102
Subject(s) - sleep (system call) , documentation , intensive care unit , medicine , psychological intervention , visual analogue scale , nursing interventions classification , nursing , emergency medicine , physical therapy , psychiatry , computer science , programming language , operating system
Background Inability to sleep is one of the most distressing factors for patients in the intensive care unit ( ICU ). Sleep is perceived as light and awakenings are numerous. Nurses' documentations of sleep are narrow, mainly concentrating on the quantity and general quality. Nurses should diversely evaluate, document and promote sleep to provide patient centered care. Aim To investigate the content of nurses' documentation about the sleep of ICU patients, patients' own perceptions of sleep, and the correspondence of the two. Design and methods Nurses' documentations ( n = 90) were analysed retrospectively with quantitative content analysis. A cross‐sectional survey of patients' ( n = 114) perspectives was collected with the five‐item Richards‐Campbell Sleep Questionnaire ( RCSQ ), on a visual analogue scale from 0 (the poorest quality sleep) to 100 (optimum sleep). The data was analysed statistically. Correspondence was tested with cross‐tabulation. Results Nurses documented sleep quantity for 71% and quality for 27% of patients, along with the needs assessment, used interventions and their effect on sleep. Patients' perspectives varied widely. Sleep depth was rated the lowest and falling asleep highest of the RCSQ sleep domains. Age of the patients correlated positively with general quality of sleep, sleep depth and falling asleep. Nurses' documentations and patients' perceptions correlated in over half of the cases. Conclusions Nurses' documentation of ICU patients' sleep is not systematic or comprehensive and corresponds only partially with patients' own perception. The sleep of non‐intubated patients is light and awakenings are frequent. Documentation of ICU patients' sleep should include the whole nursing process, i.e. needs assessment, interventions used, and evaluation of sleep and the effects of the interventions, along with patients' own perspective to promote patient‐centered care. Relevance to clinical practice Evaluation and documentation of patients' sleep must include patients' own perception to be comprehensive. Nurses' documentation should include all elements of nursing process.