Patients' and Nurses' Perceptions of Hope-Engendering Nurse Interventions and Their Influence on Patients' Perception of Hope During Health/Illness Transitions

Hope is considered a basic human need. However, with increased emphasis on cost control, productivity, and evidence-based practice, time allocated for hope-engendering nurse interventions could be in jeopardy without sufficient evidence to support its importance. While caring for patients in the acute care setting, nurses have an opportunity to offer hope through their nursing actions.;The primary purpose of this descriptive correlational and comparative study was to explore patients' and registered nurses' perceptions of hope-engendering nurse interventions. Other study purposes were to explore patients' perception of hope, the differences between patients' and nurses' perceptions of hope-engendering nurse interventions, and to explore the relationship between patients' perceptions of hope-engendering nurse interventions and patients' perceptions of hope. Meleis' Transitions Theory guided this study, as patients are vulnerable during health/illness transitions.;A convenience sample of 97 patients and 91 nurses from 5 sites was invited to participate in this study. Patients in the acute care medical-surgical hospital setting completed the Herth Hope Index (HHI), the Hope-Engendering Nurse Intervention -- Patient Version (HENI -- PT) Instrument, and a demographic questionnaire after one day, but prior to their fourth day, of their hospital stay. Nurses on the same hospital units as patients completed the Hope-Engendering Nurse Intervention -- Nurse Version (HENI -- RN) Instrument and demographic questionnaire via SurveyMonkeyRTM . Cronbach's alpha reliability coefficients for the HENI -- PT (N = 97) were .97 for the total scale (Parts A and B) and from .86 to .92 for the subscales. Cronbach's alpha coefficients for the HENI -- RN (N = 91) were .96 for the total scale (Parts A and B) and from .82 to .89 for the subscales. Cronbach's alphas for the HHI (N = 97) were .88 for the total scale and .57 to .81 for the subscales. Power requirements were met.;Descriptive and inferential statistics were computed using SPSS RTM. Patients' and registered nurses' perceptions of hope-engendering nurse interventions differed significantly with patients' scores consistently lower than nurses' for total scores (t = -4.95; p < .001) and subscale scores. There was a statistically significant, weak relationship between HENI -- PT and HHI (r = .27; p = .008). Rank ordering for patient and nurse HENI revealed very few similarities with patients' scores consistently lower than nurses'.;This study extended Meleis' Transition Theory in methodology, applying the theory in a quantitative study; further developed two new instruments to measure HENI; explored the use of the HHI and HENI in a population of patients and nurses in an acute medical surgical setting. Findings suggest a need for nursing education in pre-licensure and practice settings via role modeling, and establishing expectations through clinical evaluation of nurse promoting activities in the provision of care. Findings also suggest a need to understand hospitalized patients' perceptions about and sources of hope, in order to implement appropriate nursing interventions.