Date of Conferral

2020

Degree

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP)

School

Nursing

Advisor

Patricia Schweickert

Abstract

Patients with heart failure (HF) have recurrent symptoms that lead to frequent hospital readmissions. Moreover, HF is one of the leading causes of 30-day hospital readmissions. Evidence shows that patients with a high level of HF self-care have decreased readmissions. HF self-care education is commonly delivered by the nurse at hospital discharge, and the patient’s transition to self-care is a critical point in the continuum of care. However, nurses must be knowledgeable of patient self-care in HF to effectively convey this information to the patient upon discharge. Therefore, this staff education project question asked whether nursing knowledge of HF patient self-care improved with nursing education on HF patient self-care discharge education. This project’s purpose was to show an increase in nursing knowledge of HF patient self-care discharge education. The situation-specific theory of HF self-care supported the project through the relation to self-behavior practices. 30 nurses from the local medical unit completed the project. Data to answer the project question was derived from pre-posttest assessment of nursing knowledge via the Nurses’ Knowledge of Heart Failure Education Principles Survey tool and was analyzed via descriptive statistics of the difference between pre-post intervention data. Analysis of the data showed a 20% improvement pre-posttest in nursing knowledge of HF self-care discharge knowledge. The success of this project can be translated to further explore the impact of nursing self-care discharge education on HF readmission rates. The capabilities of the nurses to provide quality self-care education to HF patients can lead to positive social change by improving patient self-care knowledge, thereby improving outcomes and decreasing hospital readmissions.

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