Nursing Interventions for Breast Cancer
September 6, 2010 | In: Nursing Interventions
Nursing Interventions: Breast Cancer
- Always evaluate the patient’s feelings about her illness and determine her level of knowledge and expectations.
- Administer analgesics for pain as needed.
- Perform comfort measures to promote relaxation and to relieve anxiety.
- If immobility develops late in the disease, prevent complications by frequently repositioning the patient, using a convoluted foam mattress.
- Provide skin care particularly in bony prominences.
- Provide measures to relive adverse effects of treatment.
- Instruct the patient or caregiver how to manage adverse effects of treatment.
- Watch for treatment complications, such as nausea, vomiting, anorexia, leucopenia, thrombocytopenia, gastrointestinal ulceration, and bleeding.
- Monitor patient’s weight and nutritional intake for evidence of malnutrition.
- Inspect the skin for redness, irritation, and skin breakdown if immobility occurs.
- In late disease, monitor the patient’s pain level and the efficacy of administered analgesics and non-pharmacologic measures.
- Assess the patient’s and family’s ability to cope, especially if the cancer is terminal.