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Nursing management of fatigue in cancer patients and suggestions for clinical practice: a mixed methods study
BACKGROUND: Fatigue is a complex and frequent symptom in cancer patients, influencing their quality of life, but it is still underestimated and undertreated in clinical practice. The aims of this study were to detect the presence of fatigue in cancer patients, describe how patients and nurses percei...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
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BioMed Central
2021
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8477483/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34583693 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12912-021-00699-9 |
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author | Tolotti, Angela Bonetti, Loris Pedrazzani, Carla Bianchi, Monica Moser, Laura Pagnucci, Nicola Sari, Davide Valcarenghi, Dario |
author_facet | Tolotti, Angela Bonetti, Loris Pedrazzani, Carla Bianchi, Monica Moser, Laura Pagnucci, Nicola Sari, Davide Valcarenghi, Dario |
author_sort | Tolotti, Angela |
collection | PubMed |
description | BACKGROUND: Fatigue is a complex and frequent symptom in cancer patients, influencing their quality of life, but it is still underestimated and undertreated in clinical practice. The aims of this study were to detect the presence of fatigue in cancer patients, describe how patients and nurses perceived it and how nurses managed fatigue. METHODS: This is a mixed methods study. Data were collected in two oncological wards using the Brief Fatigue Inventory (BFI), an ad hoc questionnaire, patient interviews, focus groups with nurses and the review of nursing records. Interviews and focus groups were analysed through thematic analysis. We used SPSS 22.0 for quantitative data and Nvivo 10 for qualitative data analysis. RESULTS: A total of 71 questionnaires were analysed (39 males, mean age 65.7 years). Fatigue was reported 5 times (7%) in nursing records, while in 17 cases (23.9%) problems associated to it were reported. Twelve patients were interviewed. Five themes were identified: feeling powerless and aggressive, my strategies or what helps me, feeling reassured by the presence of family members, feeling reassured by nurses’ gestures, and being informed. Three themes were identified through the focus groups: objectivity and subjectivity in the assessment of fatigue, nurses’ contribution to the multidisciplinary management of fatigue, and difficulty in evaluating outcomes. CONCLUSIONS: The approach to the management of fatigue was unstructured. Patients were satisfied with the care they received but needed more information and specific interventions. Useful aspects were identified that could be used to change health professionals’ approach towards the management of fatigue. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12912-021-00699-9. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-8477483 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2021 |
publisher | BioMed Central |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-84774832021-09-28 Nursing management of fatigue in cancer patients and suggestions for clinical practice: a mixed methods study Tolotti, Angela Bonetti, Loris Pedrazzani, Carla Bianchi, Monica Moser, Laura Pagnucci, Nicola Sari, Davide Valcarenghi, Dario BMC Nurs Research BACKGROUND: Fatigue is a complex and frequent symptom in cancer patients, influencing their quality of life, but it is still underestimated and undertreated in clinical practice. The aims of this study were to detect the presence of fatigue in cancer patients, describe how patients and nurses perceived it and how nurses managed fatigue. METHODS: This is a mixed methods study. Data were collected in two oncological wards using the Brief Fatigue Inventory (BFI), an ad hoc questionnaire, patient interviews, focus groups with nurses and the review of nursing records. Interviews and focus groups were analysed through thematic analysis. We used SPSS 22.0 for quantitative data and Nvivo 10 for qualitative data analysis. RESULTS: A total of 71 questionnaires were analysed (39 males, mean age 65.7 years). Fatigue was reported 5 times (7%) in nursing records, while in 17 cases (23.9%) problems associated to it were reported. Twelve patients were interviewed. Five themes were identified: feeling powerless and aggressive, my strategies or what helps me, feeling reassured by the presence of family members, feeling reassured by nurses’ gestures, and being informed. Three themes were identified through the focus groups: objectivity and subjectivity in the assessment of fatigue, nurses’ contribution to the multidisciplinary management of fatigue, and difficulty in evaluating outcomes. CONCLUSIONS: The approach to the management of fatigue was unstructured. Patients were satisfied with the care they received but needed more information and specific interventions. Useful aspects were identified that could be used to change health professionals’ approach towards the management of fatigue. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12912-021-00699-9. BioMed Central 2021-09-28 /pmc/articles/PMC8477483/ /pubmed/34583693 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12912-021-00699-9 Text en © The Author(s) 2021 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open AccessThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data. |
spellingShingle | Research Tolotti, Angela Bonetti, Loris Pedrazzani, Carla Bianchi, Monica Moser, Laura Pagnucci, Nicola Sari, Davide Valcarenghi, Dario Nursing management of fatigue in cancer patients and suggestions for clinical practice: a mixed methods study |
title | Nursing management of fatigue in cancer patients and suggestions for clinical practice: a mixed methods study |
title_full | Nursing management of fatigue in cancer patients and suggestions for clinical practice: a mixed methods study |
title_fullStr | Nursing management of fatigue in cancer patients and suggestions for clinical practice: a mixed methods study |
title_full_unstemmed | Nursing management of fatigue in cancer patients and suggestions for clinical practice: a mixed methods study |
title_short | Nursing management of fatigue in cancer patients and suggestions for clinical practice: a mixed methods study |
title_sort | nursing management of fatigue in cancer patients and suggestions for clinical practice: a mixed methods study |
topic | Research |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8477483/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34583693 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12912-021-00699-9 |
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