Physical Health Care for People with Severe Mental Illness: the Attitudes, Practices, and Training Needs of Nurses in Three Asian Countries.
People with severe mental illness (SMI) have considerable unmet physical health needs and an increased risk of early mortality. This cross-sectional survey utilized the Physical Health Attitude Scale (PHASe) to examine the attitudes, practices, and training needs of nurses towards physical health care of people with SMI in three Asian countries (Hong Kong, Japan, Qatar). Cross-country differences were explored and linear regression was used to investigate if nurses' attitudes and confidence were associated with their level of involvement in physical health care. A total of 481 questionnaires were returned. Hong Kong nurses were less involved in physical health care than those from Japan and Qatar. Nurses' attitudes and confidence were significant predictors of their participation in managing physical health. Compared with western countries, more nurses in this study felt that mental illness was a barrier to improving physical health. Three-quarters reported that they needed additional training in promoting cardiometabolic health. The perceived need for additional training in physical health care was held by Mental Health Nurses (MHN) irrespective of their type of nursing registration and nationality. Nurse educators and service providers should reconsider the physical health care training requirements of nurses working in mental health settings in order to improve the physical health of people with SMI.
['Bressington|Daniel|D|0000-0003-0951-2208', 'Badnapurkar|Ashish|A|', 'Inoue|Sachiko|S|0000-0003-1840-5631', 'Ma|Hin Yeung|HY|', 'Chien|Wai Tong|WT|0000-0001-5321-5791', 'Nelson|Deborah|D|', 'Gray|Richard|R|0000-0001-9694-4206']
D000328:Adult D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel D002983:Clinical Competence D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies D005260:Female D006293:Health Promotion D006723:Hong Kong D006801:Humans D007564:Japan D008297:Male D001523:Mental Disorders D008875:Middle Aged D000072184:Nurse Specialists D011568:Psychiatric Nursing D011780:Qatar D057566:Self Report
physical health care severe mental illness nurse education nurse attitudes