KUMJ | VOL. 18 | NO. 4 | ISSUE 72 | OCT.-DEC. 2020
Perception Regarding Care of Attempted Suicide Patients among Nursing Students in Kathmandu University School of Medical Sciences
Bajracharya J, Bhandari N, Chalise P, Tiwari D
Abstract: Background
Suicide is an act of deliberately killing oneself. It is a global health problem and is the
second leading cause of death in 15 to 29 years. Thus, studying nursing students’
perception towards suicide attempters has paramount importance in understanding
and addressing the existing gaps in healthcare delivery system.
Objective
To assess the nursing students’ perception towards attempted suicide and to find out
the association between perception and selected variables.
Method
A descriptive, cross sectional design was carried out to assess the nursing students’
perception towards suicide attempters in Kathmandu University School of Medical
Sciences. The respondents were 193 nursing students. A structured questionnaire
was used in order to collect data. Descriptive statistics including frequency,
percentage, mean and standard deviation were calculated to summarize the data
and inferential statistics, Mann Whitney-U test was used for the association between
perception and selected variables.
Result
A total 193 nursing students participated in this study. The scores between 1 and 2.4
were considered ‘positive’, ‘unsure’ or ‘uncertain’, between 2.5 and 3.4 and negative
for 3.5 and above’ over all nurses showed relatively negative perception towards
suicide attempters. According to results from eight domains of perception, those
who did not attend the courses on psychiatry nursing presented higher score, which
was found to have significant association with permissiveness, unpredictability
and incomprehensibility. A younger nursing student shows significant association
with incomprehensibility. Younger nursing student showed statistically significant
association with duration of suicide process.
Conclusion
Nursing students are frequently encountered with attempted suicide patients.
Therefore, they must be aware of their attitudes toward this group of patients as
part of their professional and therapeutic role. Thus a nurse’s positive perception
towards attempted suicide can play a key role in communicating and preventing a
future suicide attempt.
Keyword : Nursing student, Perception, Suicide attempters
