Guided Imagery and Other Complementary Pain Control Approaches for Critical Care Patients.

For centuries, pharmacologic interventions have been the primary intervention for pain in intensive care patients. Opioid use has significant side effects and long-term risks including addiction and loss of life. Critical care nurses and other health care professionals can include effective nonpharmacological complementary modalities to reduce pain.

How Entering Students View Nursing as a Profession After COVID-19: A Qualitative Study.

The COVID-19 pandemic significantly affected the nursing profession. Nurses were called heroes during the pandemic, yet nursing is now suffering a staffing crisis. This phenomenological study asked 15 incoming first-semester nursing students about their perceptions of the nursing profession.

The Gut Microbiome and Mental Health.

The gut microbiome has been well researched in the past few years and may be a target for treating mental illness. Trillions of bacteria in the digestive system work with the brain, immune function, and endocrine pathways. This gut microbiome ecosystem mediates the interaction between the human being and the environment making its inclusion in holistic nursing essential.

Nursing Burnout and Its Impact on Health.

Burnout in nurses can have negative consequences for the organizational health of the institution and the mental and physical health of the nurse. In this article, the authors identify the incidence of burnout in nursing and risk and protective factors. Next, they discuss the relationship between burnout and health, highlighting the critical relationship between burnout, stress, inflammation, and declines in physical health.

Systematic Review of Burnout in US Nurses.

Nurses experience high levels of burnout, and this has become a major factor in recruitment and retention of nurses. Several factors have been associated with burnout, but it is not clear which factors are the most significant predictors. Understanding the most prevalent factors that are associated with burnout will allow for the development and implementation of interventions to ameliorate and/or reduce burnout in the nursing workforce.

Health consequences of childhood sexual abuse.

Purpose: This article provides a summary for advocacy, court testimony, assessment, treatment, prevention, and further research studies in the field of childhood sexual abuse.

Findings: A literature review identifies the psychiatric, social, and disease disorders to which this population is predisposed. Adult survivors experience more depression, obesity, autoimmune disorders (irritable bowel syndrome, asthma, fibromyalgia), eating disorders, and addictions.

Stress management for adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse: a holistic inquiry.

Among the many sequelae of childhood sexual abuse is a maladaptive response to stress. Stress has been linked to a reduction in the immune system's ability to resist disease. The purpose of this exploratory mixed-method study is to examine the experience of stress management training for 35 adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse.

Cytokines and their role in depression.

Purpose: This study aims to review the cytokines that mediate the inflammatory process, the interleukins and the interferons, and the interaction of cytokines with serotonin as causative factors in the role of depression.

Conclusions: Administration of proinflammatory cytokines to treat medical diseases induces depressive symptoms in humans. Patients diagnosed with depression tend to have high levels of cytokine activity and impaired immune response, as well as those patients suffering from inflammatory processes.