Useful terms for nursing practice in the care of people with leprosy.

Objectives: To identify useful terms for nursing practice in the care of people with leprosy and to cross-mapp the identified terms with the ICNP® terms.

Method: A descriptive, documentary study that included publications of the Ministry of Health in the area of leprosy launched between 2002 and 2017. The terms identified in these publications were extracted and underwent a normalization proces and then, were cross-mapped with terms of the ICNP® version 2015 for the identification of constant and non-constant terms in this terminology.

Results: In total, were extracted 1,177 terms, of which 26.76% were equal, 4.59% similar, 4.26% were broader, 19.62% were more restricted, and 44.77% were totally different from the ICNP® terms.

Conclusions: The large number of terms identified and not included in the ICNP® show the need for its expansion in order to contemplate the phenomena of clinical practice more effectively and allow better representation of nursing care for people with leprosy.