Drug-taking habits of families and individuals. A nurse’s survey in a neighbourhood.
Albert, É.

Objective: to survey the drug taking and drug storing habits of members of 75 village households.
Method: questionnaire with open and closed questions, inspection of drugs stored at home and interview.
Results: the drug-related knowledge of villagers was found to be insufficient and relying on the package inserts written in a professional idiom and on the often contradicting lay advice. The knowledge was especially lacking with regard to antibiotics and antipyretics. The ensuing dangers are clear, which is made even worse by the high number of self-medicating persons. The level of information was found to be higher among those with hypertension. The number of different drugs that had been taken and were now stored at home was very high (243) and the shelf-life of the majority of them had already expired.
Conclusions: there is a need for carefully planned health promotion activities, an important element of which could be the counselling provided by nurses visiting patients in their homes.

Eating disorders: Nurses’ level of knowledge – implications for practice
Komáromi, M.:

Objective: to investigate the level of nurses’ professional knowledge (factual knowledge, tolerance, ability of active involvement) on eating disorders.
Method and sample: questionnaire survey on a voluntary basis of nurses from 3 Hungarian counties. The sample consisted of nurses at psychiatric wards (41.5%), medical wards (40.5%) and other wards (18%). In addition, interviews were conducted with psychiatry nurses at county hospital.
Findings: 59.5% of the nurses surveyed had satisfactory professional knowledge about eating disorders, 53% exhibited appropriate levels of tolerance towards patients suffering from this condition. Significant difference (p<0,001) was seen in this respect between nurses graduating from a baccalaureate program versus nurses with lower educational level, as well as in the levels of tolerance of nurses with appropriate versus inappropriate knowledge.
Conclusion: as nurses lacking knowledge on eating disorders might not be able to appropriately carry out prevention, greater emphasis should be put on teaching eating disorders and mental health issues in the basic nursing curriculum.

The enforcement of patients’ rights in patient information
Kovács Tóth, Á..

Objective: to determine the extent to which patients’ rights have been enforced in the field of information since the entry into force of Act CLIV of 1997 on Health Care.
Method and sample: triangulation; self administered questionnaires with closed questions in 95% and open questions in 5% were used to survey patients (N=203) and nurses (N=164); and findings were evaluated in the light of interviews and observation.
Findings: 13% of the patients had not heard about patients’ rights, and 55.6% had learnt about them from one of the media. In the nurses’ views, 84.1% of the patients were moderately or even less informed about their rights; 88.2% of the patients in the sample had received information orally, 1% in writing and 9.9% both in writing and orally. Shortcomings in the information process were identified by patients and nurses alike in relation to the presentation of treatment options.
Conclusions: there is a need for changing attitudes in order to enforce human rights more effectively. Patients’ rights include knowledge, an awareness of one’s own situation and potentials, because only if appropriately informed can patients make choices or refuse treatment.

Nursing as a profession
Szentgyörgyi, M.

Objective: to identify personal opinions about the nursing profession, the future of nursing, difficulties in practicing nursing and about the motivation to enter nursing.
Method: questionnaire survey of 20 nurses working in nursing for 2.5-23 years.
Findings: a substantial proportion of respondents liked their profession and went into nursing driven by inner motivation; they considered nursing as a vocation, which they intended to practice until retirement. However, answers reflected the difficulties due to objective circumstances, physical and psychological stress and a feeling of desperation over their inability to perform quality nursing. Some saw the future of nursing positively, and acknowledged the recent great developments in nursing education.
Conclusions: nurses in the profession for many years would take up work day by day to maintain the image of nursing and will not give up despite the difficulties. Greater attention should be devoted to young nurses starting their career, who cherish an optimistic image of nursing and look forward to positive changes, albeit already confronted with the severe burdens and shortcomings of the objective circumstances.