Animals As Healing Agents For Children in Pain

Dog Tag. Image © Alice Merkel. All Rights Reserved. On Flickr.

Doggie Visits Provide Comfort and Healing

Emphasizing and Quantifying Comfort for Hospitalized Children with Animal-Assisted Therapy, is a well documented student project investigating the comforting effects of Doggie visits to reduce pain and enhance comfort for patient healing. 

Do you have a dog or cat? How do animals bring you comfort in your daily life? The paper below details a research study quantifying the effect of animals as healing agents for children in hospital environments.

Please note that children had no problems documenting their increased comfort with the Comfort Daisies designed by Kolcaba, and that comfort was different than pain.  These two findings are particularly important for anyone wanting to do comfort studies with children.

Read the complete paper published to Scribd below. 

Emphasizing and Quantifying Comfort for Hospitalized Children

Add your stories and comments in the "comment box" below we'd like to hear from you! 

How do you employ forms of comfort in your life, for your children and loved ones? What methods do you use to bring on relief, ease and transcendence from hurts and pains that may be encountered in daily living? What tips can you offer? 

For more information about research in Comfort Theory, please visit the website, The Comfort Line.

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Copyright 2012 Katharine Kolcaba, RN, MSN, PhD. Creative Commons 3.0 Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works. Katharine Kolcaba, RN, MSN, PhD, The Comfort Line, Chagrin Falls, Ohio 44022. E-mail: kathykolcaba@yahoo.com Phone: 440-655-2098 Web: http://thecomfortline.com/

- Betsey Merkel, The Comfort Line and Comfort Is Strength Communications

Aging in Place

Mom, Dr. M and KK

Aging in place is generally thought to mean staying in one’s home when frailty sets in, instead of moving to a nursing home or assisted living. It occurs, not by chance, but through careful planning. So, sometime shortly after retirement, one puts oneself and significant other into a house or apartment which is suitable for aging bodies and perhaps aging minds. The reality of future aging is embraced instead of denied; longevity into one’s 80’s or 90’s is accepted and planned for. Conditioning one’s body and mind to age in healthy ways is, of course, important but not the only ingredients to aging in place.

The ability to “age in place” also requires a simpler life style and a community where one can walk or take public transportation safely (preferably to useful shops and services to reduce dependence on cars). Other basics consist of few or no steps inside or out, good lighting, a bedroom, full bath, and laundry on the main floor, affordable rent, mortgage, and/or utilities, and family or neighbors in close proximity. 

As a nurse who specializes in gerontology and care management for elders, I know from experience where potential pitfalls exist for aging adults, most of whom do not anticipate needing any housing modifications in their futures. But before they know it, steps become an issue, followed by transportation, decreased vision, and inability to launder clothes or bathe oneself because facilities are on the second floor or in the basement. And of course, decreased income and holes in the customary safety net for elders exacerbates all of the pitfalls and makes spur of the moment modifications costly and often impossible.

Recently, a gerontological nurse from Japan visited me to talk about Comfort Theory. She also wanted to attend a class at the university where I still teach when I want to. (I am fortunate to be in nursing, where faculty are scarce and I can pick up courses when I want them.) During that class, a case study about home-care was discussed in depth, revealing to my guest a value system in our country that she said was not present in Japan. That is: try to keep elders in their home for as long as possible with the supports they need, because they usually DO BETTER. 

After that class, I thought we should visit my mother, nearly 92, who lives alone in her own home with help from nursing aides for a few hours every morning. After she retired, she decided to move near me, her only remaining adult child. She bought a bungalow that we have adapted over the years as her physical capabilities diminished. She can no longer walk unassisted, her vision and hearing are very poor, but she is thriving in mind and spirit. She entertains herself with books on tape, the news, and our hapless Cleveland sports teams. She knows where all her handholds are in her house, she has Meals on Wheels and warms things in a microwave, and she has Lifeline and a walker. I pour her meds, renew her prescriptions, and watch her health status. Financially, she is assisted by Medicaid and reduced utilities through a state run program for people in need. She is oriented and humorous, loves visitors, and keeps her house tidy. She says that is where she wants to die (although not in the near future!).

My visitor was amazed and said, “In Japan, our frail elders are almost always in nursing homes.” Finally, something we do well in the U.S. – at least for right now. With looming cuts in social services, I am not so confident that my adult children will have the same safety net that my mother does. But I do know, I will be set up physically in my perfect elder-friendly home and community where I can walk to stores, wash myself and my clothes, and keep my little home clean. This is where I have the most comfort, and where I will do better,  just like my mom.

- Kathy Kolcaba
 

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Copyright 2012 Katharine Kolcaba, RN, MSN, PhD. Creative Commons 3.0 Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works. The Comfort Line, Chagrin Falls, Ohio 44022.  E-mail: kathykolcaba@yahoo.com Phone: 440-655-2098 Web: http://thecomfortline.com/ 

-Betsey Merkel, Comfort Is Strength Communications

Patient Comfort: Engaging the Full Nursing Arsenal

Response to the NYT Op-Ed Contribution, March 15, 2112, by Theresa Brown, Oncology Nurse. The article is entitled, “Hospitals Aren’t Hotels.” 

Article link: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/0/15/opinion/hospitals-must-first-hurt-to-heal.html 

In this article, Nurse Brown made the observation that questions about “Patient Satisfaction”  fail to reflect the true nature of hospital care, which tends to be (by its nature) “invasive, painful and even dehumanizing.” She goes on to say that “sometimes we cannot give them the kind of help they need” and ends with, “In order to heal, we must first hurt.” 

From my patient comfort perspective, nurses may participate in painful procedures, but the WAY IN WHICH THE PRIOR EXPLANATIONS AND THAT PROCEDURE ARE DONE can make all the difference in the world.  In other words, the expert nurse does both: he or she may deliver a painful chemotherapy, but while doing so holds the patient’s hand, explains what is happening, sometimes distracts,  and always offers comfort and soothing words in order to give the patient a life line. The patient’s needs are acute and pervasive during such procedures, and the best nurses address all of them, including physical pain, immobility, anxiety, terror, depression, dread, hopelessness, or loneliness.  I would hope that NO nurse would become hardened to a patient’s distress, but rather engages the full arsenal of comforting nursing strategies to help patients transcend pain and suffering. For it is these important nursing functions that are the only things that can give our patients hope and courage in the face of extreme stress.

- By Kathy Kolcaba

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Copyright 2012 Kathy Kolcaba, PhD., RN. Creative Commons 3.0 Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works. The Comfort Line, Cleveland, Ohio USA. Phone: 440-655-2098 Web: http://thecomfortline.com/

-Betsey Merkel, Comfort Is Strength Communications