Effects of mobile text messaging on breast cancer and breast self-examination (BSE) knowledge, BSE self-efficacy, and BSE frequency: a randomised controlled trial.

AIMS: Educating women regarding breast cancer and increasing breast self-examination uptake continues to remain a major challenge despite the intensive campaigns. An innovative, cost-effective and easily customised intervention is needed especially in under-resourced and hard to reach communities. This paper is a report examining the effects of mobile text messaging on women's knowledge of breast cancer and BSE, BSE self-efficacy and frequency of BSE. METHODS: A randomised controlled trial design was used. The study sample consisted of 128 women of reproductive age (WRA) (64 in the experimental group and 64 in the control group) from two communities in the Philippines during the months of August to October 2018. Three to five short messages were sent to the participants in the experimental group daily for one month while the control group did not receive the messages. RESULTS: Women who received mobile text messages had higher knowledge of breast cancer (F = 21.756, p = 0.001) and breast self-examination (F = 6.776, p = 0.010) than the control group. However, no significant improvements were seen in the BSE self-efficacy (F = 1.446, p = 0.232) and frequency of BSE (F = 3.374, p = 0.69). CONCLUSION: Mobile text messaging significantly improved the knowledge on breast cancer and breast self-examination among women; however, it did not affect their breast self-examination self-efficacy and frequency. Mobile text messaging can be a viable tool that can be used by healthcare workers in order to educate women regarding breast cancer and breast self-examination.

Relationship between nurse practice environment and work outcomes: A survey study in the Philippines.

AIMS: Challenges in the nurse practice environment greatly affect nurse work outcomes. This study investigated the relationship between nurse practice environment and work outcomes in the Philippines. METHODS: This cross-sectional survey involved 549 hospital nurses in the Philippines in 2018. The nurse practice environment was measured using the Practice Environment Scale of the Nursing Work Index (PES-NWI). Four self-report scales were used to measure work outcomes: job satisfaction, job burnout, job stress and nurse-assessed quality of care. Multiple linear regression analysis was used to analyse the data. RESULTS: Significant relationships were found between nurse and organizational characteristics and nurse practice environment. Further, multivariate regression analysis revealed that the nurse practice environment had a significant and positive relationship with perceived quality of care and a significant and negative relationship with job burnout and job stress. CONCLUSION: A favourable work environment significantly reduced job burnout and job stress and improved the quality of patient care. With considerable migration abroad, a favourable nurse practice environment may engage a better nurse workforce in the country and subsequently reduce migration. Managers must focus on developing good nurse practice environments that will improve professional work outcomes and quality patient care.

The association of nurse caring behaviours on missed nursing care, adverse patient events and perceived quality of care: A cross-sectional study.

AIM: This study evaluated the role of nurse caring in predicting missed nursing care, adverse patient events and the quality of nursing care. BACKGROUND: Missed nursing care is an issue essential in health care, as it is associated with adverse patient events. While studies have previously examined factors that result in missed nursing care activities and adverse events, the role of nurse caring itself in this context has not yet been explored. METHODS: A cross-sectional research design was adopted, employing a convenience sample of 549 registered nurses from six hospitals in the Philippines identified between October 2018 and January 2019. Four self-report scales were used in this study as follows: the caring behaviour inventory, the missed nursing care scale, the adverse patient events scale and a single-item scale to measure the quality of nursing care. RESULTS: Comforting or talking with patients and changing patients' positioning in bed were the most frequently missed care tasks, while patient/family complaints and patient/family verbal abuse were the most frequently reported adverse events. Nurse caring strongly predicted the quality of care, missed nursing care and patient adverse events. CONCLUSION: Fostering caring behaviours among nurses has a profound effect on nurses' decision to omit or provide nursing care as well as on reducing adverse events and promoting quality nursing care. IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING MANAGEMENT: The adoption of strategies to improve caring behaviours among nurses is critically important to prevent or reduce the occurrence of errors and adverse events.