title: An integrative literature review on nursing interventions aimed at increasing self-care among heart failure patients.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  to analyze and summarize knowledge concerning critical components of interventions that have been proposed and implemented by nurses with the aim of optimizing self-care by heart failure patients.
  
  
  METHODS
  PubMed and CINAHL were the electronic databases used to search full peer-reviewed papers, presenting descriptions of nursing interventions directed to patients or to patients and their families and designed to optimize self-care. Forty-two studies were included in the final sample (n=4,799 patients).
  
  
  RESULTS
  this review pointed to a variety and complexity of nursing interventions. As self-care encompasses several behaviors, interventions targeted an average of 3.6 behaviors. Educational/counselling activities were combined or not with cognitive behavioral strategies, but only about half of the studies used a theoretical background to guide interventions. Clinical assessment and management were frequently associated with self-care interventions, which varied in number of sessions (1 to 30); length of follow-up (2 weeks to 12 months) and endpoints.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  these findings may be useful to inform nurses about further research in self-care interventions in order to propose the comparison of different modalities of intervention, the use of theoretical background and the establishment of endpoints to evaluate their effectiveness.
authors.affiliation: Faculté des sciences infirmières, Université Laval, Québec, QC, CA.
authors.forename: Sophie
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Boisvert
authors.affiliation: Faculté des sciences infirmières, Université Laval, Québec, QC, CA.
authors.forename: Alexandra
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Proulx-Belhumeur
authors.affiliation: Escola de Enfermagem de Ribeirão Preto, Universidade de São Paulo, Ribeirão Preto, SP, BR.
authors.forename: Natalia
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Gonçalves
authors.affiliation: Faculté des sciences infirmières, Université Laval, Québec, QC, CA.
authors.forename: Michel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Doré
authors.affiliation: Institut universitaire de cardiologie et pneumologie de Québec, Québec, QC, CA.
authors.forename: Julie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Francoeur
authors.affiliation: Faculté des sciences infirmières, Université Laval, Québec, QC, CA.
authors.forename: Maria Cecilia
authors.initials: MC
authors.lastname: Gallani
mesh_terms: D006333:Heart Failure / Q000451:nursing*; D006801:Humans; D009736:Nursing Process; D012648:Self Care