Nursing behaviors relevant to pressure injury in the general hospitals of Changsha, China.

OBJECTIVES:To investigate the status and the related factors of nursing behaviors for pressure injury, and to provide the evidence for standardizing pressure injury management. METHODS:A total of 1 039 clinical nursing staff from 4 general hospitals in Changsha from December 1 to 30, 2017 were selected by a stratified random sampling procedure. Nurses' demographic information such as age, gender, title, educational attainment, and department were collected. We investigated the status of nursing behaviors on pressure injury by a self-designed questionnaire, assessed nurses' knowledge of pressure injury and nurses' attitude of pressure injury using the Pressure Ulcer Knowledge Test and Attitude towards Pressure Ulcer Prevention Instrument, respectively, compared the nursing behaviors on pressure injury with different backgrounds, used multiple linear regression to analyze the influential factors for nursing behaviors on pressure injury, and conducted the Pearson correlation analysis for nurses' knowledge, attitude, and behaviors on the pressure injury. RESULTS:The overall nursing behaviors score on pressure injury was 155.96±17.29. The 5 dimensional scores from high to low were: risk assessment (4.42±0.49), prevention actions (4.40±0.50), risk understanding (4.35±0.52), injury assessment and interventions (4.27±0.55), and health education (4.25±0.63). A significant difference was found in the nursing behavior scores of pressure injury among ages, lengths of service, education, and training times (all P˂0.05). There was no correlation between nurses' knowledge and behaviors (P=0.606). The nurses' attitude was positively correlated with their behaviors (r=0.307, P˂0.001), and the nurses' knowledge was also positively correlated with their attitudes (r=0.212, P˂0.001). The results of multiple linear regression showed that the length of service (≤5 years), training times (1-2 times), education (diploma or below), the scores of nurses' knowledge, and the scores of nurses' attitude were independent influencial factors of nurses' behaviors on pressure injury. CONCLUSIONS:The nursing staff in the general hospital of Changsha has a high level of nursing behaviors on pressure injury, and they has good sense of responsibility and confidence. However, personal competence in pressure injury is insufficient and still needs to be improved. The nursing managers should focus on the nurses' attitude and training frequency, increasing the experience in nursing the pressure injury and practical level, and arouse the highly educated nurses' enthusiasm and sense of accomplishment to prevent pressure injury, thus reducing the incidence of pressure injury.