Clinical Trial Details
— Status: Active, not recruiting
Administrative data
| NCT number |
NCT05994430 |
| Other study ID # |
20221401 |
| Secondary ID |
|
| Status |
Active, not recruiting |
| Phase |
N/A
|
| First received |
|
| Last updated |
|
| Start date |
May 1, 2023 |
| Est. completion date |
October 30, 2023 |
Study information
| Verified date |
August 2023 |
| Source |
Istanbul University |
| Contact |
n/a |
| Is FDA regulated |
No |
| Health authority |
|
| Study type |
Interventional
|
Clinical Trial Summary
This study was designed as a prospective randomized controlled study in order to evaluate the
effect of end-of-life care awareness training to be given to intensive care nurses on the
knowledge levels, attitudes, and behaviors of nurses. The study was conducted between May and
July 2023 with 76 nurses working in the Anesthesia and Reanimation Intensive Care Unit,
General Intensive Care Unit, and Cardiovascular Surgery Intensive Care Unit of Van Training
and Research Hospital, who met the inclusion criteria. The hypotheses of this research:
H1: End-of-life care awareness training increases the knowledge level of intensive care
nurses about end-of-life care.
H2: End-of-life care awareness training positively affects intensive care nurses' attitudes
toward end-of-life care.
H3: End-of-life care awareness training positively affects the behaviors of intensive care
nurses towards end-of-life care.
Nurses who completed their undergraduate education worked in intensive care for at least one
year, actively continued their profession (no annual leave, report, etc.), and were willing
and voluntary to participate in the study were included in the study. Nurses who had a
palliative care nursing certificate, had received training on end-of-life care by
participating in a training program such as ELNEC, and had not participated in the training
program of the study for more than two sessions were not included in the study.
At the beginning of the research, the pre-test forms/scales "Nurse Information Form",
"End-of-Life Care Knowledge Test" and "Intensive Care Nurses' Attitudes and Behaviors Towards
End-of-Life Care Scale" were administered to all nurses. After the pre-test application, the
nurses were randomly included in the training and control groups. A randomization list
generated by a computer-based random number sequence was used to determine which group the
intensive care nurses would be in.
- The "End-of-Life Care Education Program in Intensive Care" prepared by the researchers
in line with the End-of-Life Nursing Education-Intensive Care program was applied to the
intensive care nurses in the training group. The training program was implemented online
for 45-60 minutes one day a week for 4 weeks. The same forms/scales were repeated 4
weeks after the training.
- Intensive care nurses in the control group did not receive any intervention during the
study. Similar to the training group, the same forms/scales were repeated 4 weeks after
the training. After the study is completed, the same training program will be applied to
the nurses in the control group.
Description:
End-of-life care is defined as a support and care program that requires the use of
psychosocial skills and techniques to meet the expectations and needs of the patient and
his/her family in cases where treatment is no longer possible and to enable the patient and
his/her family to live as comfortably as possible in this final period. According to World
Health Organization data, more than 30 million individuals have died due to a disease
requiring end-of-life care and approximately 20 million of them need intensive care. It is
observed that nurses do not have sufficient knowledge and skills in clinical practice due to
the lack of importance given to end-of-life care in the nursing education curriculum. In
recent studies, it is a remarkable result for intensive care nurses that intensive care
nurses cannot define end-of-life care and that their knowledge about end-of-life care is not
at the desired level. These results in the literature reveal the importance of end-of-life
care education for intensive care nurses. It has been reported that the end-of-life care
provided by intensive care nurses to patients and their relatives is affected by nurses'
attitudes and behaviors towards end-of-life care as well as their level of knowledge. In
addition, examining the attitudes and behaviors of intensive care nurses about providing
end-of-life care will guide both the awareness of the problems experienced by nurses and the
planning of effective care services. In this context, it will be possible for intensive care
nurses to provide holistic and holistic care to the patient and his/her family at the end of
life, to meet the psycho-social needs of the patient, to have sufficient knowledge about
end-of-life care and to exhibit positive attitudes and behaviors. This study was designed as
a randomized controlled trial to evaluate the effect of end-of-life care awareness training
to be given to intensive care nurses on their knowledge levels, attitudes, and behaviors.
The sample of the study consisted of intensive care nurses working in the tertiary intensive
care units of the University of Health Sciences Van Training and Research Hospital. Sampling
calculation was done with G Power 3.1.9.7 package program. The number of nurses included in
the study was calculated as a minimum of 34 nurses for each group with 80% power and 5% type
1 error, taking the study of Ghaemizade et al. (2022) as an example. However, in order to
secure the sample number and to keep the power value high, the sample number was increased
and a total of 76 nurses, including 38 nurses in each group, were included in the sample.
Randomization Method: After obtaining the permission of the ethics committee, patients who
meet the inclusion criteria in the study and who have received written informed consent to
participate in the study will be divided into two groups in equal numbers with the
computer-based randomization method.
Statistical analyses were performed using the SPSS-22 package program. Kolmogorov-Smirnov
test, skewness, and kurtosis values were used to test whether the data were normally
distributed. Number, percentage, mean, standard deviation, median, and minimum-maximum values
were used in descriptive statistics. Independent samples t-tests and chi-square tests were
used to compare the demographic characteristics of the two groups. Independent samples t-test
was used to compare the mean scores of the dependent variables (end-of-life care knowledge
test, attitude, and behavior levels) of the two groups. The t-test for dependent samples and
the ANOVA test were used to compare the mean scores of the dependent variables of each group
at baseline and 4 weeks (±3 days) after the training (within-group differences). Following
the analysis of variance, the "Tukey test" was used to determine different groups. Pearson
correlation coefficients were calculated to determine the relationships between continuous
measurements. The statistical significance level was taken as 5% in the calculations.
