Construction and validation of nursing diagnoses for people in palliative care

OBJECTIVE: to construct and validate nursing diagnoses for people in palliative care based on the Dignity-Conserving Care Model and the International Classification for Nursing Practice. METHOD: a two-stage methodological study: 1) construction of the database of clinically and culturally relevant terms for the nursing care for people in palliative care and 2) construction of nursing diagnoses from the database of terms, based on the guidelines of the International Council of Nurses. RESULTS: the 262 terms validated constituted a database of terms from which 56 nursing diagnoses were developed. Of these, 33 were validated by a group of 26 experts, and classified in the three categories of the Dignity-Conserving Care Model: illness-related concerns (21); dignity-conserving repertoire (9); and social dignity inventory (3). CONCLUSION: of the 33 validated diagnoses, 18 of them could be included in the update of the Catalog of the International Classification for Nursing Practice - palliative care for a dignified death. The study contributes to support the clinical reasoning and decision making of the nurse.