Effect of Applying Nursing Interventions for Preventing Pressure Ulcers among Hospitalized Geriatric Patients

Although there is extensive published information on the prevalence of pressure ulcers in manycountries of the world, yet there is a lack of researches concerning the application of nursinginterventions for their prevention in hospitals. Objective: Determine the effect of applying nursinginterventions for preventing pressure ulcers among hospitalized geriatric patients. Setting: The studywas carried out in Tishreen University Hospital, Lattakia, Syria. Subjects: The study subjectscomprised 40 hospitalized geriatric patients. These were divided equally into two groups: study andcontrol. Each group comprised 20 elders. Elders in the control group were left to the hospital routinewhile those in the study group were subjected to nursing interventions for two weeks. The appliednursing interventions include reposition schedule, use pillows to protect bone prominences, properbed making twice daily, prevention of skin moisture, adequate fluid intake, care for elders hygieneand use cream on bone prominences. Tools: Three tools were used for data collection: the sociodemographicand clinical structure interview schedule, Skin assessment observation check list and theBraden scale for predicting pressure ulcer risk. Results: The implemented nursing interventions had apositive effect in preventing the development of pressure ulcer among elders in the study group wherethe majority of the patients showed no pressure ulcers or no sign of pressure ulcer after two weekswhile pressure ulcers were observed among more than two thirds of the patients in the control group.Conclusion: The program succeeded in preventing the development of pressure ulcers.Recommendations: Hospitals policy should enforce the application of nursing intervention measuresto prevent the occurrence of pressure ulcer.