Compassionate Care Delivery: Elderlies’ Perception

Background: Compassion may have a direct effect on the quality of care provided to patients so that they normally evaluate the quality of services based on the compassion demonstrated by the nurse providing compassionate nursing care can lead to higher satisfaction in patients, safer care, saving time and cost, a sense of satisfaction and effectiveness in the personnel, higher confidence, and coping skills in them. Aim: measure elderly patients’ perception of compassionate care in Beni-Suef city. Design: A descriptive cross-sectional design. Setting: This research was conducted at Beni-Suef University Hospital, General Hospital, as well as Continuing/Long-term care and Home Health Care (HHC) services. Sample: All elderly (140) patients receiving care at the mentioned setting. Tools: Two tools have been used to gather data; 1) Structured questionnaire interview sheet; 2) Opinions about compassionate care: This section consisted of 20 statements on a 4-point Likert type scale ranging from “extremely important” to “not important.” They were categorized into 4 dimensions. Results: The mean age of the study sample was 66.3±9.6 years, 60.0% were from medicine departments, and diabetes was the most common admission diagnosis among the patients in the study sample. The median duration of illness was 8.5 years. A statistically significant relationship between patients’ opinions of compassionate care and their education (p=0.002). A statistically significant relationship with the history of previous surgery (p=0.002). The opinions of compassionate care were higher among those with previous surgery. Conclusion: the patients in the study settings tend to have high perceptions and opinions regarding compassionate care, and this is influenced by their age, education, income, as well as the duration of their illness, and the length of hospital stay. Recommendations: Elderly patients’ opinions about the nursing care provided to them and how far their expectations are achieved regarding compassionate care should be regularly surveyed, with proper action according to the results. Further research is suggested to evaluate the long-term effect of in-service training programs on nurses’ practice of compassionate care and their related self-confidence.