Preventing skin tears (STs) in older adults is an urgent public health concern, especially in long-term care (LTC) facilities. However, limited research on ST prevention among care workers exists due to a lack of suitable assessment tools. This study aims to develop and psychometrically evaluate the Knowledge, Attitude and Practice instrument for care workers in preventing Skin Tears (KAP-ST) in older adults.
The KAP-ST was developed and validated in four phases during May–October 2024. First, an item pool was generated through a comprehensive literature review. Second, a preliminary instrument was developed through a Delphi expert consultation and pilot testing. Third, the items and the final instrument were optimised through a cross-sectional survey involving 317 care workers from 29 LTC facilities in China. Finally, a psychometric evaluation was conducted in another cross-sectional survey involving 373 care workers from 18 LTC facilities.
The final KAP-ST contains 35 items across knowledge, attitude and practice dimensions. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) revealed a nine-factor structure (factor loadings ranging from 0.451 to 0.799, accounting for 61.35% of total variance). The Item-Level Content Validity Index (I-CVI) values ranged from 0.926 to 1.000, and the Scale-Level Content Validity Index (S-CVI/Ave) was 0.991. The instrument's Cronbach's α, split-half, and test–retest reliability coefficients were 0.887, 0.744, and 0.934, respectively. The CFA analysis revealed an ideal absolute fit validity (RMSEA = 0.068; RMR = 0.029) and parsimony fit validity (PGFI = 0.684).
The KAP-ST demonstrates strong reliability, structural validity and content validity. It is well-suited for assessing care workers' knowledge, attitudes and practices in preventing STs among older adults. Further research is required to enhance and confirm its validity.
STs in the spotlight recently necessitate the use of appropriate investigative tools to facilitate in-depth research, especially for care workers, who should prioritise access to specialised knowledge. Introducing professional guidance in LTC facilities is recommended to enhance the knowledge, attitude and practice of care workers.
Standardised Guidelines for Scale Construction and COSMIN checklist.
No patient or public contributions.
To explore how the mentor-student relationship affects nursing graduate students' satisfaction with mentors, as well as how mentoring mode and learning motivation work together.
A multi-centre cross-sectional study.
Thirty universities and colleges in eastern, central and western China.
A total of 826 nursing graduate students from thirty universities and colleges participated in this study in April 2024.
Data were collected using the general information questionnaire, mentor-student relationship entry, mentoring mode questionnaire, graduate students' satisfaction item and learning motivation scale. Data were analysed using SPSS 25.0 software. The PROCESS macro-plugin and the bootstrap method were utilised to examine the mediating and moderating effects of learning motivation and mentoring mode.
There was a positive correlation between nursing graduate students' satisfaction with mentors and the mentor-student relationship (r = 0.377, p < 0.001), learning motivation (r = 0.600, p < 0.001), and mentoring mode (r = 0.292, p 0.001). Learning motivation exerted a partial mediation effect between the mentor-student relationship and graduate students' satisfaction with mentors (mediation effect value = 0.182, 95% CI = 0.148–0.218). Mentoring mode moderated the path of learning motivation in the mentor-student relationship (interaction term coefficient = 0.031, 95% CI = 0.005–0.056).
Mentor-student relationship positively predicted nursing graduate students' satisfaction with mentors significantly. Learning motivation played a partial mediating effect between mentor-student relationship and graduate students' satisfaction with mentors and mentoring mode moderated between mentor-student relationship and learning motivation pathways. Therefore, cultivating positive teacher/helpful friend relationship, boosting students' learning motivation and improving mentoring mode techniques can all increase nursing graduate students' satisfaction with mentors.
No patient or public contribution.
To systematically analyse international empirical literature and establish a comprehensive understanding of the push and pull factors influencing retention and turnover among mid-career nurses.
An integrative review.
PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, EMBASE (Ovid), and CINAHL (EBSCO) were searched for studies published between January 2001 and November 2024.
An integrative literature review was conducted following the five-step process outlined by Whittemore and Knafl. Articles were screened by title, abstract, and full text based on predefined inclusion and exclusion criteria. The quality of eligible studies was assessed using the Mixed Methods Appraisal Tool (MMAT). Data were extracted and synthesised narratively, and the findings were presented according to the socio-ecological framework.
A total of 1930 studies were identified, with 14 included for analysis: 10 qualitative, 3 quantitative, and 1 mixed-methods study. Guided by the socio-ecological framework, four themes and 10 subthemes emerged: (1) Intrapersonal (professional knowledge/skills, health issues, work-family balance); (2) Interpersonal (professional collaborative relationships, supervisor support); (3) Organisational (organisational characteristics, work characteristics, career development); and (4) Societal (salary/benefits, Social/governmental recognition).
This review reveals the heterogeneity of research on this topic and confirms previous findings. It identifies certain push-and-pull factors common to nurses across all stages of their careers. However, mid-career nurses face unique challenges, including more complex healthcare demands, declining health status, growing family caregiving responsibilities, unclear organisational roles, underutilisation of professional skills, career stagnation, and limitations on salary growth. These findings highlight the need for tailored retention strategies for mid-career nurses.
A “one-size-fits-all” retention strategy does not meet the needs of all nurses. To improve nurse retention rates, it is essential to address the shifting demands and priorities that arise as nurses reassess and transition through different career stages. For mid-career nurses, acknowledging and valuing their expertise and capabilities, providing sufficient resources, and fostering a supportive work environment that promotes career development may be effective strategies for retaining these experienced professionals.
Following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines.
No Patient or Public Contribution.
To explore the perceptions and experiences of parents caring for children with paediatric feeding disorders requiring feeding tubes (PFD-T).
A descriptive qualitative approach was adopted in this study.
Using purposive sampling, 12 parents were recruited from paediatric inpatient wards and the outpatient paediatric feeding clinic at a tertiary public hospital in Singapore. Data collection was done from July to December 2024. Semi-structured one-on-one interviews were conducted with the parents (fathers or mothers) until data saturation. Thematic analysis was used to identify themes from the interview content.
A total of three themes and six subthemes were identified, encapsulating the challenges experienced by parents with caregiving and feeding tube management, as well as the sources of support they had. The themes are: (1) A sense of community, (2) Grieving over the loss of normalcy and (3) Facing the unknown.
Parents in this study felt supported being in a community of other parents with children who have PFD-T. It enabled them to gain valuable information and offered them a space where they felt understood. At the same time, they expressed feelings of guilt and isolation, as the caregiving demands led to limited capacity to cater to or interact with other loved ones. Additional challenges parents faced included transitioning between types of feeding tubes and insufficient support from healthcare professionals.
Ethical approval was obtained from the National Health Group Domain Specific Review Board (DSRB 2024/00064) on 8 May 2024.
This study followed the reporting guidelines outlined by the COnsolidated criteria for REporting Qualitative (COREQ) research checklist.
This study did not include patient or public involvement in its design, conduct, or reporting.
To develop a structured intervention aimed at enhancing family communication to reduce relapse in adolescents with depression.
This study follows a multi-stage process guided by the Intervention Mapping procedure with the Medical Research Council framework, assessing the layers of complexity. Its design comprises four interrelated stages to construct a family communication intervention, culminating in a pilot randomised controlled trial.
The program has four stages: (1) Identifying family interaction gaps through literature review and expert input; (2) Investigating communication needs of depressed adolescents and their families via a mixed methods study to develop a model intervention; (3) Refining the intervention with focus groups and expert e-Delphi; and (4) Finalising the intervention based on pilot randomised controlled trial outcomes. The research will be conducted in Greater Accra, Ghana.
The process will result in a family communication intervention tailored to the needs of adolescents with depression and their families. It will be pilot tested, and the results will inform a nationwide efficacy trial.
This research integrates qualitative and quantitative data to inform the development of an evidence-based family communication intervention. The program will carefully examine data integration and contextual challenges encountered during its implementation.
The intervention has the potential to enhance family communication, thus playing a crucial role in adolescent depression recovery by reducing relapse rates. Healthcare professionals will benefit from a structured, evidence-based communication tool that can be used in clinical settings.
The study focuses on improving communication between families of adolescents with depression, aiming to develop a family communication package for clinical and community use. This intervention may enhance recovery outcomes and reduce relapse risk for adolescents.
This study adhered to the GUIDED guideline for reporting intervention development studies.
No Patient or Public Contribution.
Ethnic minoritized women face cultural and systemic barriers in accessing antepartum and intrapartum care. Healthcare providers play a pivotal role in addressing these challenges, but their perspectives and experiences in delivering culturally competent care remain underexplored.
To synthesise healthcare providers' experiences and perspectives on providing culturally competent antepartum and intrapartum care for ethnic minoritised women.
A qualitative meta-synthesis study design was employed. Six electronic databases were searched from their inception date till January 2025. The included studies were assessed using the method of the Critical Appraisal Skills Programme tool, and findings were meta-synthesised using Sandelowski and Barroso's six-step approach. This review was registered via the International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews.
Overall, 38 studies were included, and three themes emerged. The first theme revealed how providers' biases and professional training distorted their ability to understand and respect cultural practices. The second theme underscored the impact of systemic barriers such as time constraints, resource scarcity and lack of representation among providers. The final theme highlighted healthcare providers' aspirations for improved communication, targeted training and guidance on building trust to enhance care delivery.
Healthcare providers encounter notable challenges in delivering culturally competent antepartum and intrapartum care, but remain hopeful about bridging gaps in communication and understanding. Practical recommendations include implementing mandatory cultural competency training at all levels of healthcare professional education, increasing resources for interpreters and cultural liaisons and fostering diversity within the healthcare workforce. Future research should explore patient-centred interventions and systemic reforms to improve care for ethnic minoritised women. These findings highlight the need for policies and practices that empower providers to deliver equitable, culturally respectful antepartum and intrapartum care.
No patient or public contribution.
To explore the illness coping experiences of patients with moderate-to-severe burns and provide a reference for healthcare professionals to formulate coping strategies.
Qualitative study using a descriptive phenomenological approach.
From 1 June to 30 September 2024, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 19 patients with moderate-to-severe burns. Colaizzi's seven-step method was used for data analysis.
Seven subthemes and three higher order themes were identified: (1) perception of illness experience; (2) coping with disease threats; and (3) benefits of coping with illness. Most of the participants faced multiple difficulties in their disease experiences, such as increased financial pressure, higher pressure on family caregiving, deformed physical conditions and negative emotions. Positive psychological qualities, family and social support played significant roles in coping with these challenges.
Patients with moderate-to-severe burns experience multiple difficulties during their recovery. Effective coping resources can help them overcome these challenges.
Healthcare professionals should work with patients with moderate-to-severe burns and their families to establish an effective support system that enhances patients' coping abilities and promotes their overall recovery.
Patients with moderate-to-severe burns face diverse challenges. However, their experiences and coping processes during recovery remain unclear. This study provided valuable insights into their illness experiences and coping strategies. The findings highlighted multiple difficulties, such as a significant increase in financial pressure and dependence on family caregiving, painful and deforming physical conditions and various negative emotions. Positive psychological qualities, family and social support play an important role in coping with these challenges. Healthcare professionals should work with patients and their families to establish effective support systems to promote overall recovery.
No patient or public involvement.
To consolidate and synthesise the literature reporting perceptions of nurses and nursing students regarding evidence-based nursing.
Qualitative systematic review.
Seven electronic databases (Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature, Embase, ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global, PsycInfo, PubMed, Scopus and Web of Science) were searched from their respective inception dates to January 2025.
The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analysis guidelines guided this review. The quality of included studies was assessed using the Critical Appraisal Skills Programme tool, and data were synthesised thematically using Sandelowski and Barroso's two-step approach.
Thematic analysis of the 19 included studies, published from 2007 to 2025, identified three key themes: (1) Advancing nursing through evidence, (2) Personal, structural and systemic challenges and (3) Promoting a new evidence-based nursing culture.
Evidence-based nursing can elevate nursing care standards and enhance patient outcomes. Numerous factors that encourage and hinder the implementation of evidence-based nursing among nurses and nursing students were reported.
This review suggests the need to incentivise nurses to champion evidence-based nursing initiatives, provide nurses and nursing students with continuing education, and develop updated evidence-based nursing guidelines. These strategies could help in cultivating a supportive evidence-based nursing workplace culture and improving the implementation of evidence-based nursing.
Valuable insights into the facilitators and barriers associated with the implementation of evidence-based nursing were reported by nurses and nursing students—the key personnel responsible for practising evidence-based nursing. Future research could be undertaken to explore the perceptions of nurses and nursing students across varied cultural settings and in underrepresented regions.
The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis guidelines.
This study did not include patient or public involvement in its design, conduct, or reporting.
To assess the global burden of pressure injuries from 1990 to 2021 and project trends to 2050.
A cross-sectional survey.
Using the Global Burden of Disease 2021 data from 204 countries (1990–2021), we performed a multilevel analysis incorporating age-period-cohort modelling, stochastic frontier analysis and Bayesian projections to 2050. Key metrics included age-standardised incidence rates, disability-adjusted life years and socio-demographic index stratification.
Global incident cases increased by 160.3%, from 1.22 million to 3.18 million. By 2050, cases are expected to reach 8.4 million, with 72.4% in low-middle socio-demographic index areas. Mortality among those aged 95 and older may triple.
The study emphasises the need for global collaboration to address the burden of pressure injuries through equitable prevention and improved healthcare infrastructure, especially in ageing and resource-limited regions.
The escalating global burden of pressure injuries in geriatric populations necessitates evidence-based approaches to optimise healthcare resource allocation and advance nursing-led prevention frameworks.
The STROBE checklist guided reporting.
Global Burden of Disease collaborators extracted the data and analysed it.
Advance care planning for people with dementia is an important process to ensure that patient preferences are respected throughout disease progression. However, the complexity of advance care planning and the challenges in effective communication hinder its implementation. The lack of clear procedural guidance for health care teams and the limited research on practical issues such as building trust and resolving conflicts further complicate this process.
To explore the key components of and processes for advance care planning for people with dementia.
The authors conducted a comprehensive search of databases, including PubMed, Embase, Web of Science, the Cochrane Library, CINAHL, NICE, Open Grey, CNKI, and Wanfang. The inclusion criteria focused on studies reporting advance care planning practices and stakeholder perspectives related to dementia.
The review included 45 studies and identified key components and processes for successfully implementing advance care planning in dementia care. These components include enhancing readiness, capturing patient wishes, and executing those wishes. The implementation processes cover assessing participation capacity, selecting surrogate decision-makers, and identifying healthcare providers who implement advance care planning. As the condition of people with dementia progresses, the role of healthcare providers who implement advance care planning becomes increasingly important in advance care planning practices.
The success of advance care planning depends on the interconnection of multiple components, and the findings offer practical insights for improving the advance care planning process to ensure that the care preferences of people with dementia are respected throughout the progression of the disease.
PRISMA-ScR.
This is a review without patient and public contribution.
To explore the experiences and perceptions of Singaporean parents in managing feeding difficulties among children with developmental disabilities.
A descriptive qualitative study design was used.
Twenty parents were recruited via convenience sampling from a paediatric feeding clinic in a public hospital in Singapore between July and October 2024. One-to-one interviews were conducted using a semi-structured interview guide. Thematic analysis was used to analyse the data.
Four themes were identified: (1) Feeding as a ‘guessing’ game; (2) mutual understanding within the family and community; (3) beliefs regarding developmental disabilities and feeding difficulties; and (4) challenges in accessing adequate support. There were a total of nine subthemes supporting these themes.
This study revealed that parents of children with developmental disabilities faced challenges in adjusting to their child's feeding preferences, dealing with conflicting views on feeding practices among caregivers, and accessing adequate support. Parents also valued instrumental support from grandparents and domestic helpers, as well as emotional support from online peers. Additional research and targeted interventions are needed to better support parents of children with developmental disabilities in managing feeding difficulties.
Policies should facilitate the provision of feeding-specific resources, treatment, and education for parents. Additionally, healthcare providers should proactively assess feeding-related concerns and address misconceptions to enhance parental awareness of feeding difficulties and how they can improve the feeding practices of their children with developmental disabilities. Future research should obtain a more in-depth understanding of how differing beliefs in feeding difficulties between parents can impact the child's developmental outcomes, as well as the support and resources that may address feeding needs in these children.
This study followed the reporting guidelines outlined by the Consolidated criteria for Reporting Qualitative (COREQ) research checklist.
This study did not include patient or public involvement in its design, conduct, or reporting.
To explore the association between body image, fear of childbirth and maternal-fetal attachment and the mediating effects of fear of childbirth among different body image profiles.
A cross-sectional study.
Pregnant women were recruited from obstetric outpatient clinics between February 2022 and October 2023. Face-to-face data were collected using validated questionnaires. First, the mediating role of fear of birth was examined between body image and maternal-fetal attachment by calculating the total scores. Then, latent analysis was performed to identify body image profiles, and the relative mediation effects were examined for fear of childbirth in the association between body image profiles and maternal-fetal attachment.
This study included 676 pregnant women, most of whom were in their third trimester. Using the total score, fear of childbirth was found to partially mediate the relationship between body image and maternal-fetal attachment. Latent profile analysis revealed three body image profiles in pregnant women: positive, moderate and negative. Using positive body image as the reference, pregnant women with moderate body image experienced a higher fear of childbirth, resulting in lower maternal-fetal attachment. Notably, the relative mediating effect of fear of childbirth was more pronounced in women with more negative body image profiles.
Body image affected maternal-fetal attachment directly and indirectly through fear of childbirth, with stronger mediating effects among women with more negative body image profiles.
The findings provide evidence on the underlying pathways between body image and maternal-fetal attachment and suggest body image and fear of childbirth as potential intervention targets to improve maternal-fetal attachment. Pregnant women with more negative body image may benefit more from such interventions.
Little is known about the pathway between body image and maternal-fetal attachment in pregnant women. Body image affects maternal-fetal attachment directly and indirectly through fear of childbirth. The mediating effects of fear of childbirth were more pronounced among women with more negative body image profiles. These findings highlight fear of childbirth in the association between body image and maternal-fetal attachment and identify women with a more negative body image as high-risk populations, which provides insights for developing personalised interventions to improve perinatal psychological health.
The study has followed the STROBE checklist for reporting method.
No patient or public contribution.