Promover a esperança em pais de crianças com necessidades especiais de saúde

: o papel do enfermeiro especialista

Abstract

Child and Pediatric Health Nursing is facing new challenges that are resulting from children´s increased morbidity, chronic illness and disabilities. A child's illness or disability can become devastating to the family and translates itself into the presence of individualized needs for nursing care, which must and should be seen in a collaborative perspective evidenced in family-centred care and in care partnership. Hope, as a multidimensional concept, has been adopted as relevant in the scope of the professional responsibility of Pediatric Nursing, and recognized as core in the care of children with special health needs and their parents. This report comes within the scope of the Master Course in Nursing, in the specialization in Child and Pediatric Health, Institute of Health Sciences (Universidade Católica Portuguesa), aiming to describe the course of development of competences, in a critical and reflective perspective, and focusing on its impact on personal and professional development as a future Nurse Specialist. Jean Watson's Theory of Human Care was adopted as a conceptual framework guiding nursing care while seeking real and transpersonal care based on an authentic relationship between the nurse and the person cared for; as well as the Zaida Charepe Model of Intervention in Mutual Help to Promote Hope in parents of children with chronic illness, as a structuring theory for practice. The goal that was assumed as a transversal objective to the training course was to develop the skills and competences of Specialist Nurses in Child and Pediatric Health, contributing to the hope promotion of children with special health needs ‘parents in different contexts of nursing intervention, based on a project methodology, and on specific goals developed in each of the internship contexts. In a primary health care setting, activities were focused on the co-construction of an Integrated Internal Assistance Process for the Child Health Appointments, as well as on the identification of opportunities for intervention in hope promotion in parents of children with special health needs in the context of early intervention. In a Neonatology unit, activities were focused on the operationalization of a hope promoting care plan for parents of new-borns diagnosed with Congenital Heart Disease. On the other hand, in a Pediatric Cardiology ward, the program "Mutual Help Group for Parents of Children with Congenital Heart Disease" was implemented as a hope promoting intervention. Finally, in a Pediatric Emergency ward, the activities were directed to the identification of the nurses needs regarding their perceptions and experiences of hope promoting opportunities and interventions with parents of children with special health needs. Also noteworthy was the publication of the scoping review carried out and the possibility of presenting, in the form of oral communication, the work developed in the Pediatric Cardiology ward. The activities developed allowed the development of numerous competences regarding the Specialized Nurse Common Competencies Profile as well as Specialized Child and Pediatric Health nurses Competencies Profile.

Date of Award	19 Jun 2019
Original language	Portuguese
Awarding Institution	Universidade Católica Portuguesa
Supervisor	Zaida Charepe (Supervisor)