Nursing And Midwifery Journal
Year:2010 | Volume:8 | Issue:3|Papers Count:10

Background & Aims: Anemia is prevalent co morbidity in heart failure that is an independent risk factor for adverse clinical outcomes in patients with congestive heart failure. The aim of the present study was to determine the prevalence of anemia in the elderly with systolic heart failure hospitalized in Alborz Hospital of Karaj during 2002-2008.Materials & Methods: This is a descriptive retrospective study that reviewed 154 medical records of elderly with systolic heart failure during 2002-2008. Demographic, laboratory, and echocardiography data were reviewed from medical records. In this study Anemia was defined as a hemoglobin level below 12 g/dL in women and below 13 g/dL in men. The data were analyzed by descriptive statistics such as frequency distribution, mean, standard deviation and independent group test and Pearson correlation coefficient.Results: The findings indicated that the prevalence of anemia in the elderly with systolic heart failure was 42.9%. There was a significant difference between the mean level of hemoglobin in heart failure with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (p=0.000) and hypokalemia (p=0.017). There was a significant association between the level of hemoglobin with age (p=0.014) and left ventricular ejection fraction (0.022).Conclusion: This study indicates that anemia is frequent among the elderly with systolic heart failure and anemia may be associated with age, left ventricular ejection fraction, serum potassium and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

Background & Aims: One of the most important elements of any organization especially health organizations is human resources. Job satisfaction leads to being interested or disinterested. The present study aimed to determine the job satisfaction of nursing staff of three hospitals in Zahedan.Materials & Methods: The present study was a descriptive-analytical study and 220 samples were involved through stratified-random sampling method. The questionnaires were distributed among nursing staff in three hospitals in Zahedan. Thirty seven questionnaires were excluded due to the lack of information. Data collection tools were the questionnaires of Wysocki and Kromm. Descriptive statistics and T test were used to analyze the data.Results: It was revealed that nursing staffs had desirable job satisfaction (mean 3.847). Satisfaction variable components were respectively: supervisor satisfaction (4.1311), job satisfaction (4.1038), satisfaction of co-workers (3.9891), satisfaction of promotion system (3.2623) and satisfaction of payment (2.5027). All variables were relatively desirable except for payment method.Conclusion: Regarding the importance of job satisfaction in nursing staffs the following suggestions are presented: offering promotions based on merit and competence; establishing friendly and sincere atmosphere and avoiding unhealthy competitions; tending toward participatory management; solving economic problems; rewarding and thanking the staff, especially in public.

Background& Aims: Night shift schedules may have negative physical, mental, and social effects on nurses and their personal life and reduces the quality of the work. This study was conducted to assess the physical and mental health of night shift nurses in hospitals of Golestan University of Medical Sciences.Materials & Methods: In this descriptive study, 152 night shift nurses were involved through easy sampling method. The data were collected using questionnaires and were analyzed by descriptive statistics, (mean and standard deviation) and inferential statistic (ANOVA test, Pearson and Scheffe post hoc test).Results: Fifty two percent of the study samples had better mental health; 48 % were fairly good; 69 % had fairly good physical health; and 2% had good physical health. There was a significant relationship between mental health associated with physical health (p<0.001). There also was a significant correlation between mental health with age (p<0/001) and job experience (P=0.002).Conclusion: In order to reduce the complications of nightshifts, it is suggested to plan fixed shift schedules. Proper management and programming appropriate shift schedule for nursing staff will be very helpful.

Background & Aims: Thalassemia is caused by hemoglobin production disorder and intense anemia.General awareness of the public is an important preventive step. This study examins the knowledge of Guilan University students about thalassemia.Materials & Methods: This descriptive cross sectional study covered 600 male and female students of Guilan university selected by random sampling. A questionnaire was used for collecting data and information. The findings were analyzed with chi-square test.Results: The level of knowledge was identified according to their knowledge about symptoms and ways of transmission and thalassemia prevention. The majority of students (58.50%) had less information, 29.33% had average and only 12.17% of them high awareness about the disease. The majority of university students in this study (92.33%) agreed with public training about Thalassemia.They believed that the media was the best way to transfer the information.Conclusion: Considering the low level of awareness among students about the disease, it is suggested to plan more training about prevention way for reducing the risk of thalassemia.

Background & Aims: A well-performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) remains important in improvement of nurse care efforts during cardiac arrests. Thus, this study sought to determine skills and performance of emergency department’s nurses in university hospitals affiliated to Urmia University of Medical Sciences in accordance to established international guidelines.Materials & Methods: The subjects were nurses working at emergency wards with the minimum of 6 month job experience at any emergency ward. The study was conducted using a standardized questionnaire including demographic characteristics of the subject, emergency department nurse performance (31 questions) in CPR or patients triage (22 questions). The data were analyzed by chisquare, fishers exact and z tests where appropriate.Results: The majority of study subjects (68.5%) showed an excellent and 3.7% had a weak CPR and triage performance. There was no significant statistical difference across the study groups by different university hospitals using fishers exact test (p=0/8). Also, no significant correlation was observed between CPR or patients triage performance and gender of the study subjects (p=0/6). However, the mean performance of male nurses was higher (28/13) as compared to that of females (26/37).Conclusion: According to the findings, it is speculated that management system of hospitals must consider nursing training programs. Due to the risks of emergency wards, skill and performance of the nurses working at emergency departments should be taken into consideration.

Background & Aims: Several studies prove the relation between religiosity and having mental health.This study aimed to study the relationship between being religious and domestic violence.Materials & Methods: This cross sectional study was conducted on 139 male volunteers that committed domestic violence living in the area covered by Social Development Research Center of Urmia and health promotion during 2008-2009. The questionnaire of Mental Health Research Center of Iran Medical University was used to gather the data. Pearson co-efficient between religiosity and intimate partner violence has calculated. Pearson correlation was used for analysis of the data.Results: Most of the volunteers committing domestic violence were either young or uneducated. The average score of domestic violence was 45.64 (maximum 84), and 129.14 (maximum 224) for being religious. Pearson correlation between domestic violence and being religious was -0.758 (p=0.011).The highest correlation was between desirable practice and physical violence (-0.969) and the lowest correlation was between religiously prohibited deeds and mental violence -0.249 respectively.Conclusion: There was a negative correlation between being religious and domestic violence (pearson coefficient was -0.758). It is suggested to reduce domestic violence in men with increasing religiosity.

Background & Aims: Despite the fact that an addict may give up consuming narcotics voluntarily for a long time, nobody can be assured that he would not restart addiction to narcotics. As shown by statistics, 80% of these people restart after less than 6 months. This research was carried out to study the factors influencing the recurrence of the addiction and find out new ways to prevent it.Materials & Methods: This a descriptive case series study includes the subjects that were selected by random sampling from self-introduced addicts (who experienced a recurred addiction) to Zahedan centers. About 200 addicts filled the researcher-made questionnaire. descriptive statistics and inferential statistics were used for data analysis.Results: According to the findings of the study, the factors that influence recurred addiction are as follows: unhealthy environment contaminated, addicted friends, the inefficiency of psychotherapy sessions. Moreover, these effects were the same on gender and age group of the self-introduced addicts (p=0.000).Conclusion: In order to prevent the recurrence of addiction, it is recommended to provide a specialist adviser and not allow the patient to socialize with addicts. Treatment programs should be more defined and strict during the first three months of recovery.

Background & Aims: One of the important goals of research studies especially in medical sciences is accurate measurement of outcome occurrence. Despite numerous efforts to reduce accuracy errors, they still occur. The aim of this study was to assess types of errors and their control methods in medical sciences studies.Materials & Methods: A comprehensive review of literature in the Internet was performed to cover most of the materials. key word of the review included bias, error, validity, and confounding. The medical databases were national and international such as IranMedex, IranDoc, PubMed, ScienceDirect, ProQuest and Ovid.Results: The literature review indicated that errors in medical sciences studies are caused due to accidental errors, biases, or sampling errors. In order to reduce study errors, attention to accuracy and validity of studies is necessary.Conclusions: It is recommended that researchers can identify and reduce potential sources of biases selecting a stronger study design, random allocation, matching, observer and interviewer blinding, validating instruments, and using multivariate statistical analysis.