Therapeutic nursing in stroke rehabilitation: A systematic review

Although attempts have been made to delineate the therapeutic contribution of nursing to stroke services, an understanding of its effectiveness in terms of patient outcomes remains elusive. This paper constructs a description of therapeutic nursing in stroke rehabilitation from key nursing theories, focusing on educative and supportive interventions enabling psycho-social recovery. Interventions are clearly located in the nurse-patient relationship that is constructed over time from a variety of sources of knowledge. A comprehensive review of electronic and other sources of research were then explored to identify those components of the description of therapeutic nursing that have been subject to robust evaluation in stroke rehabilitation. Two studies were identified that met the inclusion criteria for this review, focusing on discrete aspects of the stroke service experience, with generally disappointing results. This review concludes that therapeutic nursing has been subject to little rigorous scrutiny, and where therapeutic interventions have been evaluated, they have failed to incorporate a strong theoretical underpinning.