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For nursing staff, these types of delays are upsetting. In a recent RCN survey, eight in ten nurses said that being unable to provide dignified care at work had caused them distress. For the patient, such lapses can be embarrassing or even humiliating reminders that their wellbeing is in the hands of others. Nurses spoke about their concerns at RCN congress last month. During a fringe event on the RCN’s forthcoming dignity campaign, nurses said high patient turnover, staff shortages, a lack of single-sex accommodation, inadequate curtains and insufficient space to maintain privacy all contributed to unacceptable care. The RCN campaign, to be launched next month, will provide nurses with a support pack to help them explain dignity issues to other staff. Evidence that such a campaign is needed can be found in the latest Healthcare Commission patient survey, published last week. It has revealed wide variations in key areas of care across English NHS trusts. Nearly one in five patients said they were treated with dignity only some of the time, and 3 per cent they were not. RCN president Maura Buchanan says dignity should be embedded in nursing practice and that senior nurses’ leadership is the most important factor in ensuring that it is. Not being able to provide dignified care at work causes nurses distress Ms Buchanan, a nurse manager at the Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals NHS Trust, says: ‘It is about treating people with respect, understanding difference, respecting people’s wishes and accepting them as they are with all their foibles.’ Jo Birrell, a senior clinical nurse in the care of older people at Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge, says nurses often strive to maintain patients’ dignity while having to deal with conflicting demands. ‘The four-hour A&E target means we might have to move a patient, even though what he or she really needs is a bath.’ Ms Birrell believes dignity means different things to different people. ‘A patient might say he wants to be called Mr Smith and he has difficulties going to the toilet, while another patient may prefer to be called by his first name and is happy to use a bottle.’ Norman Young, a nurse consultant in mental health, says the key to dignity is empathy. ‘It is about seeing things from the other person’s point of view. If you lose sight of that, you start to do things for other reasons, such as speed, and then you are not meeting the patient’s needs.’
Nursing Standard – Royal College of Nursing (RCN)
Published: May 21, 2008
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