Nurse's experience in nursing hypertensive patients : A descriptive literature review

Abstract: Background As the standard of living increases and the global population ages, theprevalence of hypertension was expected to rise further, and research suggested thateffective and consistent care may have a positive impact on hypertension. Nursesplayed an important role as caregivers, communicators and educators when caring forpatients with hypertension and had gained much experience in caring forhypertension.Aim This study aimed to describe nurses' experiences in caring for patients withhypertension.Methods A descriptive literature review. All articles were manually searched by thePubMed electronic database through Medline and Cinahl electronic database andmanual search, 32 articles were selected for research and analysis of literature studiesthat may be relevant to the purpose of the study. After the final exhaustive screening,9 literatures were selected as the results of the article analysis.Results Among the nurses' experiences of caring for hypertension explored in thispaper were divided into positive and negative experiences. Self-monitoring of bloodpressure, good communication with patients, external support and adequate healtheducation were beneficial to the care of hypertension, which made nurses feelrelieved, be trusted and need to be responsible. On the other side, patients' poorlifestyles and behaviors, wrong ideas and beliefs, lack of knowledge about thedisease, inadequate health promotion, blurred roles and lack of time and opportunitiesto enhance professional skills were detrimental to the care of hypertensive patients,which made nurses feel disgruntled, outraged, frustrated, apologetic and complained.Conclusions Nurses' experiences in caring for patients with hypertension weredivided into positive and negative. In future nursing processes and clinical practice,nurses were able to feel as they care for patients, to express their own experiences andfeelings, both positive and negative, and to learn from them, and providing value topromote nursing program and health development.Keywords hypertension; nursing care; nurses ' experience