Assessing the practices of palliative and end-of- life care among nurses at Cape Coast Teaching Hospital

Abstract

In the past decade, the number of people living with life-threatening diseases has increased. However, these people need to live their remaining lifetime as meaningful as possible, even when they are at the end stage and may have few months to live. This study therefore sought to examine the practices of palliative care (PC) and end-of-life care among nurses at Cape Coast Teaching Hospital (CCTH). The study employed analytical cross-sectional design. The instrument used for the study was a questionnaire and 215 respondents were randomly selected. Frequency counts and percentages, means and standard deviations, one sample t-test as well as Pearson product moment correlation coefficient (r) was employed in the analysis. The results of the study showed that the nurses at CCTH have a good knowledge in palliative care (M=17.4, SD = 0.91). They also have a favourable attitude towards palliative care. Again, the study found that nurses at CCTH to a great extent practice palliative care. The study also revealed a statistically significant, low positive correlation (r = 0.146, p = 0.041) between nurses’ knowledge and practice; and between knowledge and attitude (r = 0.313, p < 0.001). More so, nurses perceived poor funding and inadequate education as the key barriers to palliative care practices at the CCTH. The study therefore, recommends that authorities at CCTH should focus on continuous in-service training as well as encouraging nurses to continually sustain favourable attitude towards the terminally ill and dying patients. More so, management should place much emphasis on the establishment of PC specialty unit in the hospital to provide holistic end-of-life healthcare to terminally ill patient who requires PC services