Self-care and improved outcomes: an intervention by heart failure nurse specialists

Background: Heart failure is a prevalent, debilitating condition. Patients need to develop and maintain effective strategies and behaviours to care for themselves and manage their illness.

Aim: The aim of this study was to evaluate whether or not an educational intervention carried out by a team of heart failure nurse specialists (HFNS), as part of usual care, enhanced self-care behaviour in patients with chronic heart failure.

Methods: A quantitative survey was carried out using the ‘Looking After Yourself with Heart Failure Questionnaire (LAYHFQ)’ to determine levels of self-care behaviour pre- and post-HFNS intervention.
All new patients registered to a community heart failure nursing service completed the questionnaire at initial assessment and6 weeks later following the nurse-led intervention (N=36). Paired t-tests (2-tailed) were carried out to determine if there were significant differences between total self-care scores before and after the
intervention, and for each individual self-care behaviour. Results: Self care was improved overall (p=0.011) with five behaviours demonstrating a statistically significant improvement: namely the uptake of flu and
pneumonia vaccination (p=0.009), regular weighing (p=0.001), recognising changes in sleep patterns (p=0.014), recognising signs of fluid retention (p=0.001), and the wellbeing dimension of going out as much as possible (p=0.019).

Conclusion: An educational intervention by an HFNS leads to enhanced self-care and may result in improved physical and psychological outcomes for patients with heart failure.