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Introduction: The aging of the population requires an appropriate knowledge of the type of care that needs to be provided to inform healthcare policies. In Italy, neither home care nursing, nor the patient experiences have ever been described. Objectives: To describe the characteristics of nurses and care recipients involved in home care. Methods: A descriptive cross‐sectional study conducted in 18 Italian Regions. Between April and October 2023, data from nurses and patients involved in home care were collected through two surveys. Psychosocial conditions in workplaces, missed care, and care experiences were assessed using validated tools. Descriptive statistics and Pearson's correlations were performed. Results: A total of 46 local healthcare units were included in this study, with a total of 2549 nurses and 4709 care recipients. Nurses (mean age 46.60; 79.48% female; 44.68% regional nursing diploma as the highest qualification) reported good working conditions (42.37; SD = 12.25; range = 0–100) and a high mean number of missed care activities (5.11; SD = 3.19; range 0–9). Most nurses (83.41%) reported high levels of job satisfaction, while 20.28% intended to leave their job. Patients (mean age 75.18; 57.57% female; 36.95% primary school), on the other hand, rated positively the care they had received (8.23; range = 0–10). Conclusions: Despite the perception of critical issues at work and some missed care, satisfaction in nurses and patients was high. These data constitute a preliminary snapshot of the studied phenomena, which will be investigated through more in‐depth analyses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Purpose: Clinical reasoning for nurses is considered a valuable component of clinical nursing competencies, but there are few tools to ascertain this. This study tested the Italian Nurses Clinical Reasoning Scale (I-NCRS) psychometric properties based on Levett-Jones' theoretical clinical reasoning model. Methods: Content, face, and construct characteristics were ascertained for their validity. The study had a two-phase design: (a) content and face validity and (b) construct validity. Results: Three factors emerged from the factorial analysis of our reference sample: nursing problems of health, nursing information of health, and nursing assessment of health. Conclusions: The scale represents a valuable tool for the self-assessment of the clinical reasoning skills of nurses. I-NCRS showed evidence of validity and reliability, being also useful for assessing clinical reasoning for educational and research purposes among Italian nurses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nurse managers play a vital role in healthcare organizations, wielding the ability to substantially enhance work environments, foster nurses' autonomy, and bolster retention within workplaces. In this context, this study focuses on the Nurse Manager Actions scale, aiming to evaluate its items' scalability as well as the scale's validity and reliability among nurses and nurse managers operating within the Italian healthcare context. The study protocol was not registered. To ensure linguistic and cultural alignment, an iterative and collaborative translation process was undertaken. Subsequently, a multi-center cross-sectional design was adopted. Using a web-survey approach, data were collected among 683 nurses and 188 nurse managers between August 2022 and January 2023. The Nurse Manager Actions scale was found to be a valid and reliable instrument in Italian after a Mokken Scale Analysis. For nurses (HT= 0.630, Molenaar–Sijtsma rho = 0.890), the scale included 6 items, while 11 items were confirmed for nurse managers (HT= 0.620, Molenaar–Sijtsma rho = 0.830). Nurse Manager Actions scale scores were correlated with increased satisfaction and decreased intention to leave for both nurses and nurse managers. The employed validation process enhanced the scale validity for use in Italy and provided a model for other researchers to follow when assessing similar measures in different populations. Measuring and empowering nurse manager actions in work contexts is essential to improve the general well-being and retention of nurses, especially in the current nursing shortage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

(1) Background: In response to the impact of religious intervention on health outcomes and the importance of documenting how nurses experience the spiritual need of 392 hospitalized patients, it is vital to provide the nursing profession with instruments to evaluate these spiritual aspects. This study describes the development and validation of the Nursing Care and Religious Diversity Scale (NCRDS); (2) Methods: A two-step design was used for NCRDS translation and psychometric validation. The tool design was developed in the first step, while the psychometric characteristics were tested in the second step. An inductive study was conducted to test the validity and reliability of the NCRDS tool. The overall sample consisted of 317 nurses; (3) Results: The final instrument comprised 25 items in five dimensions. The construct validity indicated five dimensions. The face and content validity were adequate. Test-retest reliability displayed good stability, and internal consistency (Cronbach's α) was acceptable (0.83); (4) Conclusions: Initial testing of the NCRDS suggested that it is a valid and reliable instrument to evaluate individuals in religious diversity, with five dimensions for evaluating the meaning of spirituality and individual belief, the religious healthcare environment, educational adequacy, spiritual and religious needs, and religious plurality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Purpose: Perceptions toward nursing diagnosis (ND) may represent core drivers of its adoption within clinical practice. Few studies have investigated perceptions toward ND within nursing academic contexts. The study was conducted to validate the Italian version of the Minnesota Nurses' Perceptions of Nursing Diagnoses (MNPND) scale on a sample of Italian nursing students and explore the psychometric structure of perceptions in a sample drawn from this population. Methods: A cross-sectional survey with an online self-administered questionnaire was used. The study used exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). Results: A three-factorstructure was obtained from parallel analysis and EFA. This was confirmed using CFA; fit statistics: MLRχ² (132) = 230.150, p <. 001; CFI = 0.94; TLI = 0.93; RMSEA = 0.05 [90% CI = 0.041–0.064]; SRMR = 0.056). Conclusions: The MNPND scale is a useful instrument to measure nursing students' perceptions of ND [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: To test the effectiveness of an educational intervention including "face to face" training, compared to a standard information program, to reduce microstomia in women with systemic sclerosis. Design: Single-blind, two-arm, randomized controlled study with a 12-month follow-up period. Setting: Hospital wards of a large Italian dermatological reference center. Subjects: Female inpatients with diagnosis of systemic sclerosis. Interventions: For both groups an information brochure and an audio-visual DVD were developed specifically for the study. The control group was assigned to educational materials alone (i.e. brochures and DVD), while the experimental group, in addition to the same educational materials, received specific "face-to-face" interventions, repeated at each follow-up visit. Main measures: Primary outcome was measurement of the opening of the mouth. Secondary outcomes was the self-reported mouth disability. Results: The intention-to-treat analysis included 63 patients. Compared to the baseline measurement, we observed an increase of the mouth opening of 0.31 cm (95% confidence interval: 0.13–0.49), P = 0.003; in the control group, the increase was 0.13 cm (95% confidence interval: 0.01–0.25), P = 0.06. The difference in improvement between the two groups was not statistically significant (P = 0.10); however, it reached statistical significance in the per-protocol analysis (39 patients, P = 0.02). Conclusion: Face-to-face nursing rehabilitation training seems to improve microstomia to a greater extent, when compared to a standard intervention based only on written and audio-visual materials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim To describe a research protocol designed to formulate a conceptual framework of informal caregiver resilience in palliative care. Background Resilience is the ability to adapt or to improve one's own conditions following experiences of adversity. The end-of-life care provided by informal caregivers is a form of adversity because it entails objective difficulties, emotional involvement and deep levels of introspection that have been stimulated by the death event. Resilience has not yet been addressed in association with end-of-life care. Design This is a multicentre cross-sectional study. Methods We will administer a questionnaire to a sample of informal end-of-life caregivers to collect data about the main psychological, behavioural and healthcare factors that impact resilience. Data analysis will include descriptive and correlational statistical techniques, multiple linear regressions and structural equation modelling. Data will be collected in multiple palliative care centres and statistical analysis will be carried out using software: SPSS version 19.0 and MPlus version 7.3. The study is supported by a grant from the Centre of Excellence for Nursing Scholarship in Italy (Research Grant number 2.13.10) that was awarded in March 2013. Discussion The study seeks to identify the predictive, mediating and moderating roles of select variables: caregivers' self-efficacy, burdens of caregiving, depression and resilience. The results of this analysis will impact the theoretical study of resilience in palliative care and will have practical implications for interventions aimed at supporting caregivers through healthcare teams. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim To test the situation-specific theory of heart failure self-care with structural equation modelling. Background Several authors have proposed theories on heart failure self-care, but only the situation-specific theory of heart failure self-care by Riegel and Dickson is focused on the process that patients use to perform self-care. This theory has never been tested with structural equation modelling. Design A secondary analysis of data from a cross-sectional study. Methods Patients with heart failure were recruited in 21 cardiovascular centres across Italy during 2011. Data were collected with a sociodemographic questionnaire, chart abstraction for clinical data and the Self- Care of Heart Failure Index v.6·2. Results A sample of 417 participants was enrolled in the study (59% males, mean age 72 years). The following propositions were tested and supported: Symptom monitoring correlates with treatment adherence; symptom monitoring and treatment adherence have a direct, positive relationship with symptom recognition and evaluation that in turn have a direct, positive relationship with treatment implementation; treatment implementation has a direct, positive relationship with treatment evaluation. In addition, the following three relationships were found: Symptom monitoring has a direct, positive relationship with treatment implementation; symptom recognition and evaluation have direct, positive relationships with treatment evaluation and symptom monitoring correlates with treatment evaluation. [Correction added on 9th April 2013, after first online publication: '...symptom monitoring correlates with treatment implementation.' has been corrected to read '...symptom monitoring correlates with treatment evaluation.'] Conclusion The data support the situation-specific theory of heart failure self-care with the addition of three new relationships that emerged from the analysis. Results of this study lend further support to the use of the situation-specific theory of heart failure self-care in research and practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]