Authors

1Belén Maestro González, 2Cristina Martín Marín, 3Raquel Hernández Blanco, 4Luzdivina Izquierdo Narganes, 5Purificación Vallejo de la Gala

Position

¹Responsable Ley de Dependencia. Enfermera de Apoyo. Dirección de Enfermería. Gerencia de Atención Primaria de Palencia.²Secretaría de Estudiantes y Docencia de la Facultad de Formación del Profesorado. Universidad de Barcelona.³Psicóloga. Proyecto DITCA (Detección e Intervención de Trastornos de la Conducta Alimentaria), Comunidad Valenciana.⁴Directora de Enfermería de Atención Primaria. Profesora en la Escuela Universitaria de Enfermería Dr. Oracio Crespo de Palencia.⁵Responsable de Equipos de Enfermería. Gerencia de Atención Primaria Palencia.

Contact email: E-mail: belen.maestro@wanadoo.es

Abstract

Objectives: to detect the work overload that the coming into effect of Law 39/2006 might have had on nursing professionals, to identify problems relating to the implantation of the Dependency Law Assessment Rating Scale and to determine the specific training needs of nursing  professionals as evaluators of the dependency level of immobilised patients.
Material and methods: a cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted in April 2009 on the opinion of the nursing professionals that comprise primary care teams in the area of Palencia. Anonymous personal polls were carried out using a self-elaborated questionnaire which gathered information on demographic data, work-related data, aspects relating to the completion of the dependency law assessment rating scale, administrative- red tape procedures and training needs.

Results: the target population was composed of 151 nurses, of which 64,23% (97) responded. Mean time for the completion of the assessment rating scale was  77,55 minutes; 40,4% (38) thought it was hard to complete, 8,5% (8) easy to complete and 51,1% said complexity was case-dependent; 69,1%(65) requested more information and 58,5% (55) were of the opinion that independent assessment nursing teams should be created. 63,8% (60) thought that patient needs had not been covered, 23,4% (22) stated that their patients died before they could be assessed and 12,8% (12) that the aids had been effective.  

Conclusions: the completion of the dependency assessment rating scale has represented an increase in the work load of nurses.  The dependency assessment rating scale is hard to fill in, it is long and in some instances does not reflect the real situation of the patients. The creation of trained groups of nursing professionals that work independently from the primary care centres would have solved these obstacles such as subjective assessment and the pressure on the part of the families.

Keywords:

assessment rating scale; Dependency Law; immobilised patientsPrimary Care

Versión en Español

Título:

Repercusión de la implantación de la Ley de Dependencia sobre los profesionales de Enfermería