How South African nurses experience the work with patient and their relatives in a trauma situation

Abstract: In South Africa there is a lot of violence and the trauma is internationally recognized as the leading cause of death. To work as a nurse in a trauma unit can be very emotional demanding, and it is of importance a high level of competence and experiences among the nurses. In situations like this, nurses do need to be aware of their own feelings, it is very easy to get less sensitive and experience lack of sympathy when the nurses are facing a stressful situation. For a nurse it is very easy to get emotional concerned when dealing with patients and their relatives, especially when children are involved. For them it can be very difficult to let go when handling with children, since, in South Africa the debriefing system is not developed. The aim of the study was to describe how South African nurses experienced their work with patients and their relatives in the trauma situations, and also to describe what kind of nursing situations they regarded as a traumatic and what coping strategies the used in these situations. As a result many nurses do feel that they do not have anyone to talk to, in the end the find there own way to cope, which vary from nurse to nurse. It is all simple solutions to handle the difficult situations that may occur. In this study a narrative interview was used to receive data. Finally the collected data were divided inte themes and sub themes.