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- Title
Greek Nurses' Knowledge and Clinical Practice about the Assessment and Management of Dermatotoxicity Caused by Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor Inhibitors (EGFR).
- Authors
Papageorgiou, Dimitrios K.; Skandalaki, Nektaria; Poulopoulou, Stavroula; Konstantinidis, Theocharis
- Abstract
Introduction: The use of monoclonal antibodies that act as inhibitors of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFRIs) have targeted action, good efficacy and are associated with a number of side effects such as diarrhea, hypomagnesemia and dermatotoxicity. Aim: The aim of the present study was to explore Greek nurses' knowledge and clinical practice about the assessment and management of dermatotoxicity caused by EGFR inhibitors (cetuximab and panitumumab). Method: A convenience sample of 57 out of 80 nurses (response rate 71.3%) from eight urban hospitals with oncology departments completed a self-administered questionnaire (DKNA), to collect information on the nurses' knowledge about the dermatotoxicity, within a 3-month time period. Descriptive statistics were calculated and both parametric and non-parametric tests were used to analyze the data. Results: The majority of nurses were females (93.0%), with average age 39(±5) years and no specialized training in oncology nursing (94.7%). Most of nurses had reported that they knew "well" or "very well" the administration process for both EGFR inhibitors (cetuximab: 89.3%, panitumumab: 85.2%). They also stated that knew "well" (47.4%) or "very well' (24.6%) that EGFR inhibitors were associated with side effects. The average percent of correct answers of nurses to the knowledge questionnaire was 63.2 (±15.8) with a median of 65.2 (range: 26.1-95.7), while the average knowledge level of nurses working at oncology wards (57.7±15.5) was lower than those at day clinics (67.4±15.0, p-value=0.021) and related with the age of nurses (p-value=0.043). Regarding the knowledge level on the administration of both EGFRi, it was differed significantly from the knowledge level on the side-eff ects (items: 1-13) caused by the administration of these EGFRi (p-value≤0.001). The knowledge level about both administration was associated with the number of cases that nurses treated every week (p-value=0.001 and p-value=0.005). In respect to the knowledge level about the side-eff ects of EGFR inhibitors, nurses working at day clinics had significantly greater levels of side-effect knowledge (t-test's p-value=0.026). Conclusions: Improvements of nurses' knowledge in the assessment and management of dermatotoxicity caused by EGFRi are necessary and more training is needed. Educational material and/or organized training programs such as oncology nursing specialization are required in order to improve Greek nurses' knowledge, care and quality of life of patients with cancer.
- Subjects
GREECE; ONCOLOGY nursing; CANCER patients; DRUG eruptions; DRUG toxicity; EPIDERMAL growth factor; MONOCLONAL antibodies; NURSING; QUALITY of life; QUESTIONNAIRES; STATISTICAL sampling; T-test (Statistics); DATA analysis software; DESCRIPTIVE statistics; MANN Whitney U Test; KRUSKAL-Wallis Test; ONE-way analysis of variance; CHEMICAL inhibitors
- Publication
Nosileftiki, 2017, Vol 56, Issue 1, p59
- ISSN
1105-6843
- Publication type
Article