Experiences of Nurses Working in the Neurosurgery Clinic on Communication Difficulties with Patients Having Brain Tumors: A Qualitative Study

Abstract

Aim:Effective communication between patients and nurses is the basic indicator of the quality of nursing care and is a patient safety issue. It is even more important in patients who are at high risk of having communication problems due to some conditions such as brain tumor, or have limitations in this regard. This study was conducted to determine the experiences of neurosurgical nurses on their communication difficulties and coping methods while providing care for patients with brain tumors.Materials and Methods:This study was planned as a qualitative research conducted with the interpretative phenomenological analysis method. In-depth, face-to-face individual interviews were conducted with 10 nurses determined through purposive sampling method.Results:The results were discussed in three groups: communication difficulties experienced by nurses, coping methods, and solution suggestions. Regarding the communication difficulties of nurses, the main themes and sub-themes of patient-related factors and institution-related factors were determined.Conclusion:It was observed that the situations in which nurses had communication difficulties and the reasons for them were multidimensional. It was determined that nurses mostly used therapeutic communication methods to solve the communication difficulties and coped with individuals’ problems by meeting their care needs; however, it sometimes turned to non-therapeutic communication.

Keywords

• brain tumors
• communication
• neurosurgery
• nursing