Nursing Practice in Recovery Room: A Case of Kibuye Hope Hospital and Mutoyi Hospital

Abstract
Background: Nursing care in the recovery room is oriented to take into account the patient’s condition after surgery intervention with its main purpose of providing direct and continuous patient observation in emergence from general or regional anesthesia. In the absence of professional assistance, patients can develop complications that can lead them into shock or death. This study aims to understand the place of nurses in guiding nursing care in recovery room in two hospitals of Gitega Province by assessing the nurse’s knowledge and attitudes for the promotion of quality nursing care for post-operative patients. Methods: A cross sectional study design was used to assess the practice of nurses in managing nursing care in the recovery room in these two hospitals. A purposive sampling method was used to select the 82 nurses working in the recovery room for these two hospitals and Alain Bouchard’s formula was used to calculate the sample size. Data were collected using a self-report method involving questionnaire completion with five components addressing participants identifications, factors related to the work organization, factors related to the work environment, factors related to healthcare system, and nursing interventions in recovery room. Results: Findings revealed a significant lack of knowledge among the participants and their attitudes were slightly poor as for most of the variables of factors related to healthcare system as their score was less than 50% and their knowledge for nursing interventions was also poor as most of variable scores were less than 25%. Conclusions: The study findings were slightly poor as their scores were less than 50% in most of the variables; therefore, it was recommended that in-service training and workshops should be organized by these healthcare facilities for the purpose of empowering the nurse’s knowledge and practice. Moreover, these institutions should provide and encourage nurses to use nursing guidelines and protocols.