title: Deciding what to do when the patient can't speak: a preliminary analysis of an ethnographic study of professional nurses in the neonatal intensive care unit.
abstract: The role of patient advocate is not easily implemented with infants in the neonatal intensive care unit because there is no way of knowing what the infant would wish to be done. Many of the nurse's actions are based on the concept of the "best interests of the infant." However, although widely used, this concept is rarely defined or described for the neonatal population. The purpose of this qualitative study was to identify themes related to the professional nurse's interpretation of the concept of advocacy. A case study design and inductive data analysis consisting of constant comparison and triangulation methodologies were used. This research resulted in multiple perspectives of a single phenomenon based on the similarities and differences in the nurse's perspective related to the concept of interest.
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Raines
mesh_terms: D006801:Humans; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D007363:Intensive Care Units, Neonatal; D009357:Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome / Q000451:nursing; D017283:Neonatal Nursing; D015404:Nursing Methodology Research; D010344:Patient Advocacy; D018579:Patient Selection; D011379:Prognosis; D036301:Qualitative Research; D012106:Research; D018570:Risk Assessment; D028761:Withholding Treatment