Paper
Friday, 21 July 2006
This presentation is part of : Caring for the Caregiver
The Contribution of Nursing to Caring in Irish Residential Intellectual Disability Services
Fintan K. Sheerin, BNS, PgDipEd, RMHN, School of Nursing, Midwifery and Health Systems, University College Dublin, Dublin 4, Ireland
Learning Objective #1: The learner will be able to identify the contribution of intellectual disability nurses to caring in residential services
Learning Objective #2: The learner will be able to understand the usefulness of standardised nursing language as a tool for describing nursing practice
Purpose: The purpose of this research was to explore the unique interventional contribution of nursing to caring within residential intellectual disability services, through the employment of standardized language. Methods: This was achieved through the use of a quantitative approach which employed a 44 item interventional schedule. This was administered across an interdisciplinary sample of 614 persons in intellectual disability services. Data collected on the interventional schedule was subjected to statistical analysis using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS Version 11.0). Descriptive and non-parametric techniques were employed in analysing and describing the data set. Overall, the results of the sample were reported in relation to frequencies of responses. Exploratory factor analysis was used in order to develop a proposed interventional model of caring in residential intellectual disability agencies. Differences between staff groups' employment of interventions were analysed through use of the Mann-Whitney test and Holms Stepdown Procedure (Pett 1997). Finally, prediction of the employment of care interventions was measured using logistic regression. Results: Five distinct interventional factors emerged from the factor analysis: physical health maintenance; psycho-social health maintenance; management; technical health; and mental health maintenance. In all factors, except mental health, significant differences were found among nurses and their non-nursing colleagues. No significant difference was noted among the in community and nurses in institutions. This suggested that there may be a core nursing role transcending settings, and involving, in particular, physical health and technical health interventions. Logistic regression demonstrated predictive relationships between the employment of the interventions and specific staff, service and client factors. Discussion: The findings of this research, challenge the perception that nursing in intellectual disability services is interventionally different from nursing in other areas. Finally, this research has demonstrated the usefulness of standardized language as a tool for exploring and describing nursing in a specialized field.

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