Implementation of health education to psychiatric patients towards promotion of quality of life: a case of St Joseph Central Hospital.

Abstract

This study sought to explore the implementation of health education to psychiatric patients in St Joseph Central Hospital in Bulawayo Metropolitan Province. A purposive sample of thirty participants from St Joseph Central Hospital out of a total of two hundred and fifty seven health care professionals who deliver health education to psychiatric patients was used. The qualitative research approach was employed in conducting the study. Thirty health care professionals were interviewed and two focus group discussions were conducted. Doctors, psychiatric nurses, occupational therapists, medical social workers and psychologists were interviewed. Checklists were also used by the researcher to analyse content. Data gathered were analysed using the constant comparison analysis method and the emerging themes which were derived from the research questions were developed. The major findings were that, health education is critical to both the psychiatric patients and their caregivers as it empowers them with knowledge and skills of self-managing themselves upon discharge, health education, and health care professionals at St Joseph followed well laid down procedures when delivering health education and they used different teaching methods. The study also revealed that, there were a number of challenges faced by the health professionals when delivering health education, chief among them were the shortages of both human and material resources, knowledge gaps and skills deficit among the health care professionals and the infrastructure that was not ideal for health education delivery.