Testing nursing sensitive outcomes in out-patient drug addicts, with “Nursing Role Effectiveness Model”

Our aim was to identify factors that contribute to a better outcome in drug users and to understand the effectiveness of nursing interventions, by applying “Nursing Role Effectiveness Model” (NREM). It's a correlational, cross-sectional study with 180 drug users in a methadone program, randomly selected from three community services. We identified that treatment time, lower co-morbidities, less poly-drug use, family support and being employed contribute to a better quality of life, better mental health, less substance addiction consequences and more satisfaction with nursing care (p < 0.05). Those data were also related with nursing interventions using Structural Equation Model and we found that nursing care contributes 29% to health outcome improvement. The model revealed itself adequate to assess the effectiveness of nursing interventions (X2: 82.51/(34) = 2.426; p < 0.01, NFI = 0.927, CFI = 0.955, RFI = 0.903, GFI = 0.917, PGFI = 0.567, PCFI = 0.722, PNFI = 0.700, RMSEA = 0.089). Compared with the NREM original model, our findings reveal new relationships between the users' structural variables and the health outcomes and also relationship between units' structural variables and nurses' structural variables.