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During the COVID-19 pandemic, most universities closed or reduced clinical placements (CPs), limiting nursing students' opportunities to practice communication and interpersonal skills before graduating. When applied in nursing curriculums, Dance Movement Therapy (DMT) enhances students' understanding of the theoretical concepts of communication and interpersonal skills, representing a valuable educational tool when CPs are reduced, as during the COVID-19 pandemic. This descriptive phenomenological study aims to describe the contribution of DMT in promoting third-year nursing students' relational skills during the COVID-19 pandemic. Thirty-four nursing students who attended a DMT workshop completed a reflective journal. Data were analysed using content analysis. Three themes emerged: struggling to care for patients during the COVID-19 pandemic, lived experience of DMT, and professional identity development. The first theme illustrates the connection participants made between their experiences during the DMT workshop and the caregiving challenges imposed by the pandemic; the second theme describes how the workshop fostered emotional and physical connections among its participants; the third theme focuses on the awareness participants acquired regarding their professional role during the workshop. When CPs opportunities are limited, DMT workshops can represent an educational tool to promote interpersonal and communication skills among nursing students, facilitating their transition into the profession.

High-quality end-of-life communication between healthcare professionals (HCPs), patients and/or their family caregivers (FCs) improves quality of life and reduces non-beneficial care at the end of life. Nursing homes (NHs) are among the contexts at the forefront of these conversations. Having a solid theoretical basis for the role of end-of-life communication in NHs in transitioning to palliative-oriented care can offer indications for research, practice, education, and policy related to geropalliative care. This study aimed to develop a situation-specific theory of end-of-life communication in NHs by refining an existing theory. A four-step integrative approach was employed that included: (1) checking the assumptions for theorization; (2) exploring the phenomenon through multiple sources; (3) theorizing; and (4) reporting. All elements of the existing end-of-life communication theory in NHs were confirmed: end-of-life communication improved the understanding of FCs about their relatives' health conditions, shared decision-making, and reflections on the desired preferences of residents/FCs for care at the end of life. Furthermore, the family environment affected the burden of FCs in the decision-making process. Finally, time and resource constraints, regulations, visitation restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and social and cultural values influenced the quality and timing of communication. The study findings confirmed the impact of the political, historical, social, and cultural context on end-of-life communication, thus providing the basis for a situation-specific theory., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Historically, there has be a close relationship between the nursing services and spiritual care provision to patients, arising due to the evolvement of many hospitals and nursing programmes from faith-based institutions and religious order nursing. With increasing secularism, these relationships are less entwined. Nonetheless, as nurses typically encounter patients at critical life events, such as receiving bad news or dying, nurses frequently understand the need and requirement for both spiritual support and religious for patients and families during these times. Yet there are uncertainties, and nurses can feel ill-equipped to deal with patients' spiritual needs. Little education or preparation is provided to these nurses, and they often report a lack of confidence within this area. The development of this confidence and the required competencies is important, especially so with increasingly multicultural societies with diverse spiritual and religious needs. In this manuscript, we discuss initial field work carried out in preparation for the development of an Erasmus Plus educational intervention, entitled from Cure to Care Digital Education and Spiritual Assistance in Healthcare. Referring specifically to post-COVID spirituality needs, this development will support nurses to respond to patients' spiritual needs in the hospital setting, using digital means. This preliminary study revealed that while nurses are actively supporting patients' spiritual needs, their education and training are limited, non-standardised and heterogeneous. Additionally, most spiritual support occurs within the context of a Judeo-Christian framework that may not be suitable for diverse faith and non-faith populations. Educational preparation for nurses to provide spiritual care is therefore urgently required., (© 2022. The Author(s).)

. Experiences implemented during the Covid period in the Novara, Vercelli, Vallemaggia and Locarno areas., Introduction: The Covid-19 pandemic promoted the organization of several initiatives for the elderly., Aim: To map the local district initiatives for citizens >65 years active during the Covid pandemic in 3 districts of Piedmont and Ticino Canton., Methods: The data were collected through interviews, contacting local Institutions, volunteer organisations and associations and through free research on the web and on institutional websites., Results: The 26 interviews were conducted between August and September 2022: 16 in the Novara area, 4 in Vercelli and 6 in Canton Ticino. Forty-six initiatives were collected, mainly addressing social-healthcare needs, of which seven were already active in the pre-covid period; overall eight are still ongoing. The initiatives consisted of listening windows, home support (meals, shopping, face-masks, delivery of clean clothes to hospitalized patients). 31 were activated by public services with the collaboration of voluntary services., Conclusions: The mapping of the initiatives showed their heterogeneity and the fundamental role of volunteering in guaranteeing the continuity of supporting services. These experiences should be consolidated over time by institutions and the public health service, enhancing the contribution of volunteers.

End-of-life conversations are among the most challenging of all communication scenarios and on the agenda of several healthcare settings, including nursing homes (NHs). They may be also difficult for experienced healthcare professionals (HCPs). This study explores the difficulties experienced by Italian NH staff in end-of-life conversations with family caregivers (FCs) during COVID-19 pandemic to uncover their educational needs. A qualitative descriptive study based on inductive thematic analysis was performed. Twenty-one HCPs across six Italian NHs were interviewed. Four themes described their experiences of end-of-life conversations: (1) communicating with FCs over the overall disease trajectory; (2) managing challenging emotions and situations; (3) establishing a partnership between HCPs and FCs; (4) addressing HCPs' communication skills needs. HCPs had to face multiple challenging situations that varied across the care period as well as complex emotions such as anxiety, guilt, uncertainty, fear, anger, or suffering, which required tailored answers. COVID-19 pandemic increased FCs' aggressive behaviors, their distrust, and uncertainty due to visitation restrictions. HCPs had to overcome this by developing a set of strategies, including adoption of an active-listening approach, supportive communication, and explicit acknowledgement of FCs' emotions. Since communication needs were mostly practical in nature, HCPs valued practical communication training.

Nurses needed to learn rapidly how to care for patients with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). This cross-sectional study identified the educational resources RNs used to learn how to care for these patients, measured the perceived usefulness of the content of these resources, and explored the most relevant educational content sought during the first wave of the pandemic. A total of 799 RNs completed an online survey. Significant differences were found in the educational resources used between RNs who cared for patients with COVID-19 and RNs who did not, as well as for RNs who changed units following the pandemic. The educational resources most often used were also ranked as most useful. The most relevant educational content sought was related to respiratory care techniques and infection containment. These findings provide insight into the educational resources available during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. They could help in developing educational programs relevant to nurses' needs during future pandemics. [ J Contin Educ Nurs . 2022;53(2):63-69.] .

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a severe impact on nursing care. This cross-sectional survey-based study compared aspects of nursing care and nurses' satisfaction with care provided before and during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. A total of 936 registered nurses (RNs) rated the frequency with which they performed fundamental care, nursing techniques, patient education, symptom management, and nurse–patient relationships before and during the pandemic. A recursive partitioning for ordered multivariate response in a conditional inference framework approach was applied. More frequent fundamental cares were associated with their frequency before the pandemic (p < 0.001), caring for COVID-19 patients (p < 0.001), and workplace reassignment (p = 0.004). Caring for COVID-19 patients (p < 0.001), workplace reassignment (p = 0.030), and caring for ≤7.4 COVID-19 patients (p = 0.014) increased nursing techniques. RNs in high-intensity COVID-19 units (p = 0.002) who educated patients before the pandemic, stopped this task. RNs caring for COVID-19 patients reported increased symptom management (p < 0.001), as did RNs caring for more non-COVID-19 patients (p = 0.037). Less frequent nurse–patient relationships before the pandemic and working in high-intensity COVID-19 units decreased nurse–patient relationships (p = 0.002). Despite enormous challenges, nurses continued to provide a high level of care. Ensuring the appropriate deployment and education of nurses is crucial to personalize care and to maintain nurses' satisfaction with the care provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]