The purpose of this study was to identify nurses'' empathy, attitude and performance of pain management for dementia patients.
The participants in the study were 114 nurses working at 12 geriatric hospital. The study measured Interpersonal Rreactivity Iindex(IRI) for empathy and nurses’attitudes of pain and performance about pain management in dementia patients.
The data were collected between September 15 and 25, 2014 using a self-administered questionnaire. Analysis of data was done using descriptive statistics, t-test, ANOVA, pearson correlation, and regression with the SPSS program.
The result is as follows:
1. Nurses'' pain management related characteristics are as follows. Nurse of 37% rated ''know well'' in the knowledge of pain management. Nurses(51.8%) received about pain management education. Most of the nurses(98.2%) perceived to the need of dementia patient pain management education. The most frequently used pain management intervention was analgesia injection(99.1%). Barriers to pain management for dementia patient were absence of guideline, previous habit of caring for dementia patients, and lock of time and knowledge.
2. There was significant positive correlation between empathic concern domain of empathy and nurses’attitudes. In addition, there was significant positive correlation between perspective-taking of empathy and performance about pain management.
3. The significant factors affecting the performance about pain management for dementia patients included perspective-taking of empathy, use of pain management guideline and nurses’attitudes of pain in dementia patients. These factors explained 12.5% of variance.
Based on the results, there is need to develop education programs enhance empathy for patients among nurses. Moreover, it is necessary to develop and disseminate pain management guidelines for the dementia patient.