Registered nurses' experience of mentoring undergraduate nursing students in a rural context: a qualitative descriptive study.

: Registered nurses in a rural context are expected to support undergraduate students during clinical placement, however, they may experience challenges that are unique to the rural context. : To describe the registered nurses' experience of mentoring undergraduate nursing students on clinical placements in a rural context. : Qualitative descriptive study.

A student's perspective of managing data collection in a complex qualitative study.

Aim: To highlight from a doctoral student's perspective some of the unexpected and challenging issues that may arise when collecting data in a complex, qualitative study.

Background: Using a qualitative approach to undertaking a PhD requires commitment to the research topic, the acquisition of a variety of research skills and the development of expertise in writing. Despite close research supervision and guidance, the first author of this paper experienced unexpected hurdles when collecting data.

Implementing and evaluating a professional practice framework in child and family health nursing: a pilot project.

Aim: This paper describes the implementation and evaluation of the NSW Child and Family Health Nursing Professional Practice Framework in one health district in New South Wales, Australia.

Background: Child and family health nurses provide specialised, community based primary health care to families with children 0-5 years. A state wide professional practice framework was recently developed to support child and family health nurses.

Orientation strategies during delirium: are they helpful?

Aim: This paper critiques literature that reports older person experiences of orientation strategies in relation to current recommendations for the management of older person delirium and makes recommendations for future research.

Background: Delirium is a common syndrome in hospitalised older people and a difficult syndrome for health care staff to manage. During delirium, older people describe experiencing altered states of reality and use of orientation strategies as part of their care.

Doing clinical research: the challenges and benefits.

The need for research in practice is well documented within nursing and other health care disciplines. This acceptance is predicated on the belief that clinically applied research will inform and improve practice and health service delivery resulting in better outcomes for consumers and their families. Nurses, however, find doing clinical research challenging.

The value of new parent groups in child and family health nursing.

A reorganization of child and family health nursing services followed policy changes in New South Wales, Australia, in the late 1990s. However, the introduction of universal and sustained home visiting to all new parents limited resources available to provide support groups for new parents. This qualitative research study used a case study approach to examine the impact of new parents' group attendance on mothers and on mothers' interactions with their baby.

Parents' perceptions and needs of children's hospital discharge information.

Two linked descriptive qualitative studies, conducted 12 months apart aimed to identify parents' perceptions of discharge information relating to a recent admission of their child to hospital. Study one participants included parents (n = 7) who telephoned a paediatric telephone triage service seeking information about their child's postdischarge care. Study 2 included parents (n = 12) of children admitted to a regional hospital's general paediatric ward.

The evaluation of tailored and web-based information for new fathers.

Background: Information and advice on infant health and development have been shown to be well received by new parents and to lead to more confident and nurturing parenting. However, in spite of the accumulating evidence highlighting the importance of fathers to the well-being of their families, fathers rarely access and utilize 'parenting' information. Tailored information for fathers delivered via email and Internet may provide an alternate route for support for fathers.

Parents' preferred child health information sources: implications for nursing practice.

Aim: To ascertain parents' preferences in sources of health information concerning their children's general health care needs, and caring for their children when they are sick.

Design: Exploratory/descriptive design. A telephone survey secured data for the study and qualitative content analysis and descriptive statistics were used for analysis.

Outcomes of a nurse-led telephone triage service in Australia.

This paper reports on a study which comprised the first comprehensive evaluation of the Kids Kare Line telephone triage service in which experienced registered nurses respond to parents' requests for health-care advice for their child. This service is located in an acute care hospital in regional New South Wales, Australia. One hundred and one parents who telephoned the Kids Kare Line responded to a telephone-administered survey designed to determine the service's efficiency and effectiveness.

Innovative leadership and management in a nursing home.

The Australian Aged Care Reform Package, implemented from October 1997, has led radical changes in nursing practice in residential aged care facilities. Apart from anecdotal evidence, however, little is known about the impact of the Reform Package on nursing staff and their practice in nursing home facilities. In an attempt to explore these issues a qualitative explorative research study was conducted in one nursing home during 2000-2001.

Parents' perspectives of health-care delivery to their chronically ill children during school.

This study sought to identify parents' perspectives about issues relating to the provision of health care to their chronically ill children while they are at school. A survey of parents with school-aged children attending the paediatric subspecialty outpatients clinic in a large teaching hospital was designed to collect both qualitative and quantitative data about this topic. Findings included that 48% (n =161) of parents participating in the study said their child required some form of care or attention while at school.

Versatility and flexibility: attributes of the Critical Incident Technique in nursing research.

This article explores the value of using the Critical Incident Technique to capture qualitative data relating to nurses' experiences in three diverse clinical contexts: (i) neonatal intensive care; (ii) palliative care; and (iii) care of the demented elderly. It is suggested that this technique enables the researcher to capture the reality of contemporary nursing practise, and nurses' experiences of that practise. It is also suggested that the versatility and flexibility of the Critical Incident Technique reveals the subtleties and complexities in nurses' experiences of practising nursing in diverse contexts, thereby promoting a deeper understanding of meanings underpinning this practise.

Challenges of recruiting a vulnerable population in a grounded theory study.

Recruitment is a crucial and fundamental part of research and one that poses various degrees of difficulty. This is particularly so when the area of research is one that is either highly sensitive, or that involves participants who are deemed to be particularly vulnerable. This article explores the inherent tensions in matters of participant recruitment among meeting the demands of institutional ethics committees, satisfying the concerns of clinicians in the field and the need to maintain methodological rigor.

Children with disruptive behaviours II: clinical and community service needs.

Objective: To assist in health service planning by determining the perceived clinical and community service needs of families resident in the Hunter region who care for a child manifesting disruptive behaviour.

Methodology: Families were eligible to participate in the survey if they had at least one child known to have one of the DSM-IV disruptive behaviour disorders, autistic spectrum disorders, behaviour problems associated with rarer forms of brain disease, brain injury or mild intellectual disability or were identified by school personnel as having significant behaviour problems. Families were recruited to the survey via schools, early education centres and clinical services.

Children with disruptive behaviours I: service utilization.

Objective: To describe the demographic characteristics and patterns of service utilization in the Hunter region (NSW, Australia) of families caring for a child manifesting disruptive behaviour.

Methodology: Families were eligible to participate in the survey if they had at least one child known to have one of the DSM-IV disruptive behaviour disorders, autistic spectrum disorders, behaviour problems associated with rarer forms of brain disease, brain injury or mild intellectual disability, or identified by school personnel as having significant behaviour problems. Families were recruited to the survey via schools, early education centres and clinical services.

Communication: principal barrier to nurse-consumer partnerships.

An 8-month pilot study conducted in urban, rural and remote areas of Australia sought to identify barriers to nurse-consumer partnerships, as well as strategies to overcome these barriers. One hundred and ninety-nine Registered Nurses (RNs) and 36 consumers participated across 14 workshops to collect data for the pilot study. Analysis of these data found that nurses' perceptions of partnership with consumers were diverse.

Assessment and documentation of bowel care management in palliative care: incorporating patient preferences into the care regimen.

Nurses in a palliative care unit (PCU) recognized that there were several inconsistencies relating to assessment and documentation of patient preferences in bowel care management. Although bowel care is recognized as of key importance to the wellbeing of palliative care patients, there is little evidence in current literature about accommodation of patient preferences in bowel care management. A questionnaire was developed to assess whether patient preferences were elicited on admission to the PCU, were documented, and were included in the bowel care regimen.

The manifestation and nursing management of agitation in institutionalised residents with dementia.

This participatory action research study is the first formal research study undertaken by nurses in a nursing development unit. The study emerged as the result of nurses brainstorming issues that they perceived to be problematic in their nursing practice and their unit environment. The nurses of the psycho-geriatric nursing development unit, Wallsend Aged Care Facility, New South Wales, Australia identified that the management of agitated behaviour manifested by their severely demented clients was a major challenge in their practice.

Nurses' use of patient notes to chart bowel care management for the palliative care patient.

Little is known about nurses' knowledge base and practice in the provision of Bowel Care Management (BCM). Recently, a study designed to investigate both factors was conducted in two hospices, one in New South Wales and the other in South Australia. Twenty-four nurses and 100 palliative care patients participated in the study.

Creating a nursing development unit in a dementia care context.

This paper describes the process through which a Nursing Development Unit (NDU) was created in a 29-bed unit in which nurses care for severely demented residents. The question about whether or not ethics clearance is required for the development phase of NDUs is discussed, and the framework in which to develop the NDU described. The benefits of using Participatory Action Research as the basis for undertaking a continuous process of reflection and change is highlighted.

Negotiated care--fundamental to nursing practice.

This paper focuses on negotiation in nursing. It suggests that negotiation, in the form of negotiated care, is a key element of nursing practice in the many contexts in which it takes place. To support this statement the process of negotiated care is illustrated by three examples.

Shared care: a partnership between parents and nurses.

Shared care refers to the formalisation of parents' participation in the care of their hospitalised children. In this paper the planning, implementation and evaluation of a pilot study of shared care in a New South Wales paediatric unit is described. Surveys conducted before and during the pilot study showed that nurses' attitudes to shared care were mostly positive.

A customer focus to paediatric health care: John Hunter Hospital.

The Department of Paediatrics at John Hunter Hospital, Newcastle, was invited to represent paediatric services in the New South Wales Department of Health's customer focus initiative. Six health care organisations were selected to be pathfinder centres in customer focus under this initiative. The aim of these pathfinder centres was to trial customer-oriented projects that would be applicable to other health care organisations.