Empowering educational actions of nurses for patients with long-term health problems: an integrative review

Aim: The aim of this integrative literature review was to identify and synthetize empowering educational actions (EEA) that can be taken by nurses to support the empowerment of patients with long-term health problems. Design: An integrative literature review. Methods: The review followed methodology by Whittemore and Knafl. Four databases (PubMed, Web of Science, CINAHL, Scopus) were searched between January 2000 and October 2023 for relevant studies published in English. After complimentary manual searches, the quality of the included studies (n = 9) was assessed independently by two researchers using a tool by Hawker et al. Data were analyzed using inductive content analysis. Results: Three main categories of nurses’ actions were synthetized: supporting patients’ knowledge and skills, supporting patients’ well-being, and supporting trust-based relationships and collaboration. Conclusion: Empowering patient education (EPE) is essential in supporting patients with long-term health problems to manage their own health. Nurses use varied empowering educational actions as part of EPE. The review’s results can be used to increase awareness and understanding of actions nurses can take to support empowerment of patients with long-term health problems as part of patient education both in clinical practice and nursing education.