Emergency Nurses' Perceptions of Providing End-of-Life Care in a Hong Kong Emergency Department: A Qualitative Study.

Introduction: Provision of end-of-life (EOL) care in the emergency department has improved globally in recent years and has a different scope of interventions than traditional emergency medicine. In 2010, a regional hospital established the first ED EOL service in Hong Kong.

Methods: The aim of this study was to understand emergency nurses' perceptions regarding the provision of EOL care in the emergency department.

Factors associated with resilience of adult survivors five years after the 2008 Sichuan earthquake in China.

Given the paucity of quantitative empirical research on survivors' resilience and its predictors in the context of long-term recovery after disasters, we examined how resilience predictors differed by gender among adult survivors five years after the Sichuan earthquake. This was a cross-sectional survey study of adult survivors (N = 495; aged 18-60) living in reconstructed communities five years into the recovery process after the Wenchuan earthquake. The instruments we used included assessments of sociodemographic characteristics and earthquake exposure level, the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale, and the Social Support Rating Scale.

A field study of the role of nurses in advocating for safe practice in hospitals.

Aim: To explicate nurses' role and the underlying processes involved in advocating for safe practice in hospitals.

Background: Nurses' role as patient advocates in safeguarding patients' interests and well-being is constantly upheld. As previous studies have fallen short in delineating the processes of how and in what conditions the patient advocate role is operationalized, this study was conducted to fill the evidence gap through examining nurses' advocacy role and practices in real clinical contexts.

Living and dying with dignity in Chinese society: perspectives of older palliative care patients in Hong Kong.

Background: the empirical Dignity Model has profoundly influenced the provision of palliative care for older terminally ill patients in the West, as it provides practical guidance and intervention strategies for promoting dignity and reducing distress at the end-of-life.

Objective: to examine the concept of 'living and dying with dignity' in the Chinese context, and explore the generalisability of the Dignity Model to older terminal patients in Hong Kong.

Methods: using qualitative interviews, the concept of dignity was explored among 16 older Chinese palliative care patients with terminal cancer.

Attributes of nursing work environment as predictors of registered nurses' job satisfaction and intention to leave.

Aim: To examine how front-line registered nurses' perception of their work environment associates with and predicts nurse outcomes in terms of job satisfaction and turnover intention.

Background: Mounting evidence has pointed to an inseparable link between attributes of the nursing work environment and nurse outcomes. However, there is a paucity of research examining nurses' perception of their work environment beyond the Western context.

Stabilizing and destabilizing forces in the nursing work environment: a qualitative study on turnover intention.

Background: The nursing work environment, which provides the context of care delivery, has been gaining increasing attention in recent years. A growing body of evidence points to an inseparable link between attributes of the nursing work environment and nurse and patient outcomes. While most studies have adopted a survey design to examine the workforce and work environment issues, this study employed a phenomenological approach to provide empirical evidence regarding nurses' perceptions of their work and work environment.

Influenza vaccine preference and uptake among older people in nine countries.

Aim: This paper is a report of a study delineating factors that influence older people's preferences and uptake of the influenza vaccine in nine countries.

Background: Vaccination uptake for the aging population in many countries still remains below the World Health Organization recommended rate. Older people who perceive higher susceptibility to and severity of influenza, and more benefits from vaccination and action cues prompting vaccination, tend to accept the vaccine, but those with more perceived barriers to vaccination are less likely to accept it.

The effect of Chinese food therapy on community dwelling Chinese hypertensive patients with Yin-deficiency.

Objectives: The objectives of this study are to evaluate the effectiveness of Chinese food therapy in correcting the Yin-deficiency and to examine its impact on the patients' quality of life and hypertension control.

Background: Epidemiological studies have shown 14-50% of people with hypertension have Yin-deficiency. Whether restoring the Yin-Yang balance by means of Chinese food therapy can help to better manage patients with hypertension has yet to be examined.

Pressure ulcer development in older residents in nursing homes: influencing factors.

Aim: This paper is a report of a study assessing pressure ulcer incidence and factors affecting pressure ulcer development among older nursing home residents.

Background: Previous researchers have shown that demographic, clinical, health status, risk and human resources factors affect pressure ulcer development among older people in various healthcare settings, but none has investigated their interactive effects among older nursing home residents.

Method: This was a prospective cohort study involving 346 residents aged 65 years or over from four private nursing homes in Hong Kong.

Ethical analysis of non-medical fetal ultrasound.

Obstetric ultrasound is the well-recognized prenatal test used to visualize and determine the condition of a pregnant woman and her fetus. Apart from the clinical application, some businesses have started promoting the use of fetal ultrasound machines for nonmedical reasons. Non-medical fetal ultrasound (also known as 'keepsake' ultrasound) is defined as using ultrasound to view, take a picture, or determine the sex of a fetus without a medical indication.

Assessing predictive validity of the modified Braden scale for prediction of pressure ulcer risk of orthopaedic patients in an acute care setting.

Aims And Objectives: To assess and compare the predictive validity of the modified Braden and Braden scales and to identify which of the modified Braden subscales are predictive in assessing pressure ulcer risk among orthopaedic patients in an acute care setting.

Background: Although the Braden scale has better predictive validity, literature has suggested that it can be used in conjunction with other pressure ulcer risk calculators or that some other subscales be added. To increase the predictive power of the Braden scale, a modified Braden scale by adding body build for height and skin type and excluding nutrition was developed.

A comparative study of Chinese, American and Japanese nurses' perceptions of ethical role responsibilities.

This article reports a survey of nurses in different cultural settings to reveal their perceptions of ethical role responsibilities relevant to nursing practice. Drawing on the Confucian theory of ethics, the first section attempts to understand nursing ethics in the context of multiple role relationships. The second section reports the administration of the Role Responsibilities Questionnaire (RRQ) to a sample of nurses in China (n = 413), the USA (n = 163), and Japan (n = 667).

Nonpharmacologic sleep promotion: bright light exposure.

This paper presents findings on utilizing bright light to entrain the sleep-wake cycle in order to improve the perceived quality of sleep.The feasibility of including bright light as one of the nonpharmacologic nursing interventions for sleep promotion is discussed. A decade ago, nurses relied on sleeping pills to solve patients' sleep problems (Halfens et al.