Nurses' Attitudes and Beliefs about the Provocative Psychological Factors for Self-Injury: A Descriptive Qualitative Study

Background Nurses have an important role in taking care of self-injury patients and their attitudes would affect the quality of care for these patients. Controversial results have been reported about the nurses’ attitude. Also, culture and context affect nurses’ attitudes. The study aimed to explore the nurses' attitudes and beliefs about the provocative psychological factors for self-injury in an Iranian context. Materials and Methods: The present study was a descriptive qualitative research that was conducted on 12 experienced nurses in taking care of self-injury patients from three hospitals of Isfahan, using purposive and snowball sampling. Data were gathered from January to July 2017 through individual semi-structured interviews and were analyzed using conventional content analysis approach and Graneheim and Lundman method. Results Findings of the study were described in two main categories including intrapersonal factors of self-injury and interpersonal factors of self-injury. The first main category contained two subcategories including poor self-awareness and self-esteem and personality immaturity. The second category consisted of three subcategories including outburst of emotions, losing spirituality and low psychosocial efficiency. Conclusion The study provide an insight into how people's mental immaturity contributing to the framing of people as vulnerable to self-injury. Therefore, it is necessary to develop and perform multiple psychological interventions such as training coping strategies to decrease the risk of self-injury. Also, policies should be adopted to promote psychosocial support for these patients.