Sjuksköterskors upplevelse av att möta patienter med psykisk ohälsa i somatisk vård : En litteraturöversikt

Sammanfattning: Background: Mental illness is a growing public health issue both in Sweden and internationally. Because of the fact that comorbidity is common in this group of patients it’s likely that nurses will come across patients with mental illness in different somatic settings. Patients often have complex needs due to their mental illness and can be challenging to care for. To enable good care for these patients it requires high competence in nursing. Aim: The purpose was to describe nurse's experiences of caring for patients with mental illness in somatic care. Method: A literature review with twelve scientific articles analyzed and compiled. The articles were retrieved from the databases Cinahl complete and Pubmed. Results: The result is divided in to three themes, Lack of knowledge leads to insecurity, Challenges in creating trust in a caring relationship and Conflicting emotions. The results showed that nurses experience of caring for patients with mental illness is negatively affected by the lack of knowledge regarding mental illness. Other factors that also affected the negative experience was lack of time, personal fears in caring for these patients and lack of support. Conclusion: The result showed that nurses experience when caring for patients with mental illness was affected by different interconnected. The factors mainly consisted of lack of knowledge, feelings of care encounter and lack of time that created challenges to build a caring relationship and good care. Nurses expressed a will to help patients suffering from mental illness but they were affected by the perception of patients being challenging to care for. Increased knowledge and competence for caregivers regarding mental illness could reduce the stigmatization that this group of patients suffer from. It could also enhance their trust in health care personnel.