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Nephrologists’ Attitudes Regarding Psychosocial Care in Hemodialysis Units

BACKGROUND: There is a high prevalence of psychosocial issues affecting patients with kidney failure. OBJECTIVE: We sought to examine Canadian nephrologists’ attitudes and opinions regarding the importance of renal patient psychosocial care, nephrologists’ roles, and experience with psychosocial car...

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Autores principales: Lehecka, Aidan, Mendelssohn, David, Hercz, Gavril
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: SAGE Publications 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8361505/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34394946
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/20543581211037426
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author Lehecka, Aidan
Mendelssohn, David
Hercz, Gavril
author_facet Lehecka, Aidan
Mendelssohn, David
Hercz, Gavril
author_sort Lehecka, Aidan
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: There is a high prevalence of psychosocial issues affecting patients with kidney failure. OBJECTIVE: We sought to examine Canadian nephrologists’ attitudes and opinions regarding the importance of renal patient psychosocial care, nephrologists’ roles, and experience with psychosocial care in addition to what barriers, if any, prevent these physicians from providing psychosocial care to their patients. DESIGN: A self-administered, survey questionnaire. SETTING: Online. SAMPLE: Canadian Society of Nephrology members who predominantly work in clinical care with adult, in-center hemodialysis patients. MEASUREMENTS: Measurements of the survey include demographics, training, and nephrologists’ opinions regarding their role in administering psychosocial care, potential administrative and patient time constraints, accessibility of other health care workers for this activity, and factors that influence or impede physicians’ ability to address their patients’ psychosocial needs. METHODS: A self-administered survey was sent to almost 500 members of the Canadian Society of Nephrology between November 2018 and December 2018. The survey questionnaire was designed to gather opinions and attitudes on psychosocial care delivery as well as potential influencing factors on nephrologists’ ability to provide this care. A univariate statistical analysis was used to analyze survey responses. RESULTS: A total of 30 nephrologists responded to the survey, generating a 6% response rate. Respondents varied across provinces, with the majority being staff nephrologists (80%). While over 94% of respondents either agreed or strongly agreed that focus on psychosocial care improves patient outcomes, only 43% felt that staff nephrologists were suited to provide this care to patients; 97% of respondents believed social workers to be the most suited to provide this. Lack of additional supporting health care members, the need for additional training, too many administrative duties, and empathy fatigue were some of the predominant barriers respondents felt prevented them from addressing the psychosocial care of their patients. LIMITATIONS: A low response rate for the survey was obtained, roughly 6%, limiting our ability to draw definitive conclusions. Survey answers by respondents may be different from those by nonrespondents. Answers may be subject to social desirability and/or selection bias. CONCLUSION: Nephrologists believe that the current psychosocial care of patients in hemodialysis units is inadequate. However, further research is necessary to elucidate the barriers nephrologists face in providing psychosocial care and the changes required to most effectively implement optimal psychosocial care for patients with kidney failure in hemodialysis units.
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spelling pubmed-83615052021-08-14 Nephrologists’ Attitudes Regarding Psychosocial Care in Hemodialysis Units Lehecka, Aidan Mendelssohn, David Hercz, Gavril Can J Kidney Health Dis Original Clinical Research Quantitative BACKGROUND: There is a high prevalence of psychosocial issues affecting patients with kidney failure. OBJECTIVE: We sought to examine Canadian nephrologists’ attitudes and opinions regarding the importance of renal patient psychosocial care, nephrologists’ roles, and experience with psychosocial care in addition to what barriers, if any, prevent these physicians from providing psychosocial care to their patients. DESIGN: A self-administered, survey questionnaire. SETTING: Online. SAMPLE: Canadian Society of Nephrology members who predominantly work in clinical care with adult, in-center hemodialysis patients. MEASUREMENTS: Measurements of the survey include demographics, training, and nephrologists’ opinions regarding their role in administering psychosocial care, potential administrative and patient time constraints, accessibility of other health care workers for this activity, and factors that influence or impede physicians’ ability to address their patients’ psychosocial needs. METHODS: A self-administered survey was sent to almost 500 members of the Canadian Society of Nephrology between November 2018 and December 2018. The survey questionnaire was designed to gather opinions and attitudes on psychosocial care delivery as well as potential influencing factors on nephrologists’ ability to provide this care. A univariate statistical analysis was used to analyze survey responses. RESULTS: A total of 30 nephrologists responded to the survey, generating a 6% response rate. Respondents varied across provinces, with the majority being staff nephrologists (80%). While over 94% of respondents either agreed or strongly agreed that focus on psychosocial care improves patient outcomes, only 43% felt that staff nephrologists were suited to provide this care to patients; 97% of respondents believed social workers to be the most suited to provide this. Lack of additional supporting health care members, the need for additional training, too many administrative duties, and empathy fatigue were some of the predominant barriers respondents felt prevented them from addressing the psychosocial care of their patients. LIMITATIONS: A low response rate for the survey was obtained, roughly 6%, limiting our ability to draw definitive conclusions. Survey answers by respondents may be different from those by nonrespondents. Answers may be subject to social desirability and/or selection bias. CONCLUSION: Nephrologists believe that the current psychosocial care of patients in hemodialysis units is inadequate. However, further research is necessary to elucidate the barriers nephrologists face in providing psychosocial care and the changes required to most effectively implement optimal psychosocial care for patients with kidney failure in hemodialysis units. SAGE Publications 2021-08-11 /pmc/articles/PMC8361505/ /pubmed/34394946 http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/20543581211037426 Text en © The Author(s) 2021 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).
spellingShingle Original Clinical Research Quantitative
Lehecka, Aidan
Mendelssohn, David
Hercz, Gavril
Nephrologists’ Attitudes Regarding Psychosocial Care in Hemodialysis Units
title Nephrologists’ Attitudes Regarding Psychosocial Care in Hemodialysis Units
title_full Nephrologists’ Attitudes Regarding Psychosocial Care in Hemodialysis Units
title_fullStr Nephrologists’ Attitudes Regarding Psychosocial Care in Hemodialysis Units
title_full_unstemmed Nephrologists’ Attitudes Regarding Psychosocial Care in Hemodialysis Units
title_short Nephrologists’ Attitudes Regarding Psychosocial Care in Hemodialysis Units
title_sort nephrologists’ attitudes regarding psychosocial care in hemodialysis units
topic Original Clinical Research Quantitative
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8361505/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34394946
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/20543581211037426
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