Competências do enfermeiro estomaterapeuta

: estudo Delphi

Abstract

The experience of surgery, which results in the creation of a stoma, has consequences on an ostomy patient that are now widely recognized, and have led to the development of the current practices by Care Nurses in stomatherapy cases worldwide. The evolution of care began approximately 40 years ago, and has continued to develop under great degree of knowledge and expertise, which allows the specific needs of this group of people, and also the corresponding health services, to be fully met. With the specialty of stomatherapy developing along this path, there is now an emerging need to determine the skills of a nurse charged with providing care to the person with ostomy, or their caregiver, and for it to be discussed at both a national and international level. As such, it is urgent to reach a specific consensus and degree of competency – recognized by their peers – so that nurses who wish to remain in the practice of stomatherapy will be able to provide the best care and contribute further to the improvement and quality of these services. Within this context, the present study now aims to establish an ostomy nurse's level of competency, not only by determining the skills required and identifying the specific functions an ostomy nurse must carry out, but also by validating these competencies using a consensus established by experts in the field, known as the Delphi technique. In terms of methodology, we have developed a level I descriptive exploratory study, using a mixed methodology. With the ostomy nurse's skills questionnaire, and requiring only one set of rounds, we and experts in the field of stomatherapy have defined and validated – with a conformity level equal to or greater than 75 % – seventeen necessary skills based on the CanMEDS framework, in the following domains: Differentiated Care, Communication, Interdisciplinary Collaboration, Management, Training /Research, Professionalism/Ethics, and Health Promotion. With the results of this study, we believe to have contributed significantly to the legal framework pertaining to an ostomy nurse's skills in Portugal. We hope that by providing clarification on the skills of an ostomy nurse, research into this area of stomatherapy will be further stimulated. Keywords: Nurse; Stomatherapist; Stomathera

Date of Award	2015
Original language	Portuguese
Awarding Institution	Universidade Católica Portuguesa
Supervisor	Beatriz Araújo (Supervisor) & Paulo Alves (Supervisor)