Care Workers’ Experiences of Emergencies with Korean Older Adults: A Qualitative Descriptive Study

Purpose: This study investigated the nature of nursing care workers’ experiences of responding to emergencies involving Korean older adults to prepare measures to strengthen nursing care workers’ practical abilities in this regard.Methods: This qualitative descriptive study used focus-group interviews and qualitative content analysis. Two focus-group interviews with 16 care workers from 16 nursing homes and home-care centers were conducted between February 1 and April 28, 2019. We collected data through these two focus-group interviews.Results: Of the 16 participants, 11 were care workers from nursing homes for older adults and five were from home-care centers. Altogether, we formulated 180 meanings from the original data and derived 64 codes from these meanings. Five categories were identified through systematic conceptualization: “panic about emergencies”, “difficulty recognizing an emergency”, “desperate need for real education”, “unsystematic emergency responses”, and “dealing with the aftermath of a patient’s death”; the categories were extracted from 21 subcategories.Conclusion: Care workers faced sudden emergencies while caring for older adults and coped with them based on their previous experiences. Nevertheless, they faced difficulties in recognizing emergencies. Our findings may help institutionalize systematic and consistent on-the-job training programs to augment care workers’ emergency preparedness.