Readiness for Hospital Discharge and Its Correlation with the Quality of Discharge Teaching among the Parents of Premature Infants in NICU

Development and validation of a Japanese version of The Quality of Discharge Teaching Scale-Parent Form (JQDTS-PF): A cross-sectional observational study

BACKGROUND

Advances in medical care have enabled home treatment and advanced medical care for children with chronic illnesses. Nurses are not only required to teach their caregivers skills but also understand the families' needs and identify their anxieties in discharge teaching. However, no measure is currently available in Japan to evaluate the quality of discharge teaching provided by nurses. Therefore, this study aimed to develop a Japanese version of the Quality of Discharge Teaching Scale Parent-Form (JQDTS-PF) developed by Weiss et al. METHODS: A Japanese version of the scale was created after obtaining permission from the original author. The questionnaire was then distributed to caregivers of children discharged from hospitals in Japan who required some form of medical care after discharge.

FINDINGS

The study population comprised 113 respondents (response rate: 93.3%). The reliability of the scale was 0.88 for "need," 0.86 for "receive," and 0.93 for "delivery." Significant positive correlations were found between the JQDTS-PF subscale and the Japanese version of Readiness for Hospital Discharge Scale (JRHDS-PF). Significant correlations were also found between child and family characteristics and subscales of the JQDTS-PF.

DISCUSSION

The developed Japanese version of the scale was found to be sufficiently reliable. Validity of the scale was also sufficiently confirmed by correlation analysis, which yielded results similar to those of previous studies.

APPLICATION TO PRACTICE

This scale would be useful in improving and evaluating the quality of discharge teaching by nurses in Japan in the future.

Rural caregivers' preparedness for detecting and responding to the signs of worsening health conditions in recently hospitalised patients at risk for readmission: a qualitative descriptive study

OBJECTIVES

This study aimed to explore informal rural caregivers' perceived preparedness to detect and respond to the signs of worsening health conditions in patients recently discharged from hospital and at risk for readmission.

DESIGN

A qualitative descriptive design and semistructured interviews were used. Data were thematically analysed.

SETTING

Data collection occurred in 2018 and 2019 in rural communities in Southwestern and Northeastern Ontario, Canada.

PARTICIPANTS

The study included sixteen informal caregivers who were all family members of a relative discharged from hospital at high risk for readmission following hospitalisation mostly for a medical illness (63%). Participants were mostly women (87.5%), living with their relative (62.5%) who was most often a parent (56.3%).

RESULTS

Three themes were identified: (1) warning signs and rural communities, (2) perceived preparedness, and (3) improving preparedness. The first theme elucidates informal caregivers' view that they needed to be prepared because they were taking over care previously provided by hospital healthcare professionals yet lacked accessible medical help in rural communities. The second theme captures informal caregivers' perceptions that they lacked knowledge of how to detect warning signs and how to respond to them appropriately. The last theme illuminates informal caregivers' suggestions for improving preparation related to warning signs.

CONCLUSIONS

Informal caregivers in rural communities were largely unprepared for detecting and responding to the signs of worsening health conditions for patients at high risk for hospital readmission. Healthcare professionals can anticipate that informal caregivers, particularly those whose relatives live far from medical help, need information on how to detect and respond to warning signs, and may prioritise their time to this aspect of postdischarge care for these caregivers.

Retracted: Readiness for Hospital Discharge and Its Correlation with the Quality of Discharge Teaching among the Parents of Premature Infants in NICU

[This retracts the article DOI: 10.1155/2022/4924021.].