The experiences of nurses in providing end of life care: a review

Author: 
Christina Yeni Kustanti

Background: Non Communicable Diseases is the main cause of 70% death worldwide may also cause various signs and symptoms so the affected person can suffer and their families have more burdens. This situation can decrease the quality of life, increase the families or caregivers’ burdens, and provide less guarantee towards the dignity of the death. Therefore, the provision of qualified palliative care and end of life care are very important. The key question of this literature review is the experiences of nurses both in palliative care specialization and outside palliative care settings in delivering end of life care including the pain management. Methods: The search strategies of the literature review generated 51 English articles from many backgrounds, with 34 studies met the inclusion criteria. All of these studies were identified from various computerized databases, the university journals, bibliographies, and reference lists between the years 2006 and 2016. Results: The experiences of the nurses can be generated into four categorizations as the needs of the patients and caregivers, the perceptions towards palliative care, the challenges in delivering end of life care, and the sources needed in delivering end of life care. Conclusion: There are numerous commendations of efforts that are very useful for nurses and the institutions to improve the quality of end of life care. It is hoped that trough these efforts, the essence of caring end of life clients and the caregivers could be expanded over and over.

Paper No: 
1134