Our PhD-student Frank Kiwanuka and his research supervisory team: Professor Tarja Kvist, UEF; Assistant Professor Natalia Sak-Dankosky, Medical University of Warsaw; Rose Nanyonga, Clarke International University, Uganda and colleague Yisak Hagos Elemayehu, Adigrat University of Medical and Health Sciences, Ethiopia recently published an article: The evidence base of nurse-led family interventions for improving family outcomes in adult critical care settings: A mixed method systematic review in the International Journal of Nursing Studies. The review analyzed and synthetized 15 studies which presented five categories of interventions: educational/informational; family involvement in care; diary; communication; and bundled interventions. Specifically, interventions that resulted in small to medium improvements in family outcomes included educational interventions with digital storytelling, a bundled intervention, informational nursing interventions, and nurse-driven emotional support. Two included studies that investigated family rounds in the ICU reported that this approach did not noticeably improve family outcomes.
The authors concluded that, the above interventions can be used – when appropriate - to extend care to families. This is substantial evidence of approaches that nurses, and other clinicians need to keep abreast to support the families of critical care patients.