Abstract:
The purpose of this research was to study the nurses' caring behavior for teminally ill patients in health care institutions. The population consisted of 270 operating nurses who were working at Ramatibobi Hosipital and the National Cancer Institute and had prior experince nursing at least one terminally ill patient. The research instrument was a set of two-part questionnaire- measurement of the nurses' carring behavior concerning ten aspects for terminally ill patients based on Watsons' Theory of Transpersonal Caring and personal data. The Cronbach's coefficient alpha was 0.96. Analysis was also based on four personal factors of the population: age, experience, education and working section. The research results reflected the following. The seven aspects and the total scores of the nurses' caring behavior on the ten aspects for terminally ill patients were high. However, the three aspects were moderate. The scores on the first aspect(formation of a humanistic - aitruistic value system) and the nith (assistance with gratificatial - phenomenological- spiritual forces) were the lowest. Concerning the age factor, the total scores of nurses' caring behavior of the nurses (aged between 40 and 60) were higher than total scores of the ones aged between 20 and 39. However, the scores of the younger nurses caring behavior on the fifth (promotion and transpersonal teaching- learning) were higher. Concerning the experience factor, the total scores ranking from highest to lowest were: the score of the nurses with 5 years' experience, of those with 3 years and 1 month- 5 years, 0-1 years, 1 year and 1 month- 2 years and 2 years and 1 month - 3 years, respectively. Upon the educational factor and the working section, the scores of the nurse with a master degree or higher were higher than the scores of those with a bachelor or lower while the six aspects and the total score of the nurses in ICU were higher than those of nurses working in the other sections.