Planning care for burn victims: relation between registered problems and the care prescribed

Abstract

This study was aimed at identifying nursing diagnoses of adult patients hospitalized at a Burn Trauma Unit based on nursing records made in the first 72 hours after the burn and at analyzing if there is a relation between the identified diagnoses and the care prescribed by the nurses. The nursing records of 42 patients were assessed and the nursing diagnoses were established. For each diagnosis the interventions prescribed by the nurses were listed. Thirteen different nursing diagnoses could be identified. We observed cases of care prescribed without the record of an associated problem and diagnoses for which there were no prescriptions. There were prescriptions proposed for the diagnoses that were identified based on the literature.