看護員 및 看護學科生의 臨終患者에 對한 態度

Attitudes of Nurses and Nursing Students Toward The Dying Patient

An investigation of the attitudes of 63 nurses and 70 nursing students at Seoul National University Hospital toward the dying and terminally ill patient was completed using the questionnaire. This study tried to find out what attitudes nurses and nursing students had about telling the truth , the informer of the truth and the place of dying and so forth. The results are as follows; (1) 19% of the subjects replied that they prefered to tell the truth and 6% of the subjects usually did not tell the truth . The rest (75%) replied that it depended on the case and circum stances. In another aspect the author found that 19% to 69% of the subjects had the tendency to tell the truth , 6% to 12% of the subjects had the tendency not to tell the truth , and 75% to 19% of th e subjects h a d no d e fin ite policy. T he attitudes of the subjects seemed not to have been affected by their religion, marital status and clinical experience. (2) Telling the impending death was recommended by the proponents because the patient should prepare the death psychologically, because he must be given the opportunity to put his affairs in order, because he has a right to know , and because the patient and family must be given the opportunity to discuss the affairs after death . Not telling was recommended by the opponents because we must help the patient to continue treatment with out giving up hope for recovery, and because the information may precipi tate a psychiatric problem. (3) As for who should be the first informer to the patient in case of telling truth , nursing students replied relatives, priest and physicians in charge, in that order, but nurses replied physicians in charge, relatives an d priest, in that order. (4) As for the place of dying most nursing students and nurses chose the home of the patient. (5) 85% of th e subjects w anted to know the truth of the impending death in case of their dying.