Dignity in care in the hospital setting from patients’ perspectives in Taiwan: a descriptive qualitative study

Yea‐Pyng Lin, Yun‐Fang Tsai and Hsiu‐Fang Chen

Journal of Clinical Nursing, 2011, vol. 20, issue 5‐6, 794-801

Abstract: Aim. The aim of this study was to explore dignity in care from patients’ perspectives in Taiwan. Background. Dignity is a core element of nursing care. In nurses’ clinical practice, maintaining the dignity of patients is an important issue because a lack of dignity in care can affect the health and recovery of patients. In Western countries, patient dignity has been well researched, but only one study has examined this topic in an Asian country. Design. Descriptive qualitative methods were used in this study. Methods. Interviews were conducted with 40 patients purposively sampled at a teaching hospital in eastern Taiwan from May–August 2009. Audiotaped interviews were transcribed verbatim, and data in transcripts were coded and analysed by content analysis. Results. The major findings revealed that many hospitalised patients were satisfied with the maintenance of their dignity. Six themes that contribute to the preservation of their dignity were identified: sense of control and autonomy, being respected as a person, avoidance of body exposure, caring from the nursing staff, confidentiality of disease information and prompt response to needs. Conclusions. The findings can help nurses better understand dignity in care because it is described from the patient viewpoint. Relevance to clinical practice. By identifying the most important factors from patients’ perspectives that contribute to dignity, nursing interventions in clinical practice can be further developed and improved.

Date: 2011
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2702.2010.03499.x

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wly:jocnur:v:20:y:2011:i:5-6:p:794-801

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Clinical Nursing from John Wiley & Sons
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().