Asian Oncol Nurs.  2012 Dec;12(4):331-338. 10.5388/aon.2012.12.4.331.

Comparison of Perception of the Neutropenic Diet between Nurses and Patients

• Kim MA
• Jeong IS

• KMID: 2168799
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.5388/aon.2012.12.4.331

Abstract

PURPOSE
This descriptive study aimed to compare the perception of the acceptable foods for the neutropenic diet between nurses and patients by food type.
METHODS
The participants were 225 nurses working at chemotherapy wards and 71 patients in chemotherapy treatment. Data were collected with a self-administered questionnaire from January 2 to February 24, 2012, and analyzed with SPSS 12.0 program using descriptive statistics and the chi2-test.
RESULTS
Eighty-eight point eight percent of nurses and 76.1% of cancer patients thought the patients needed the neutropenic diets. The most important decisional criteria to determine dietary restriction was neutrophil count for nurses and food type for patients. The two groups showed significantly different allowance to raw fruits and raw vegetables, sterilized canned juice, fried vegetables, yogurt, uncooked tofu, salted fish, cooked fish, cooked shellfish, uncooked grain powder, jellified food, home-made bread/cookies, nuts including peanuts, instant coffee or tea and tea brewed. In general, patients were more permissive about the neutropenic diet than nurses.
CONCLUSION
It is recommended to consider patients' preference as well as nurses' professional knowledge and publish standardized clinical diet guidelines for neutropenic patients with collaboration between nurses and patient representatives.

Keyword

Neutropenia; Diet; Perception

MeSH Terms

Arachis
Edible Grain
Coffee
Cooperative Behavior
Diet*
Drug Therapy
Fruit
Humans
Neutropenia
Neutrophils
Nuts
Patient Advocacy
Shellfish
Soy Foods
Tea
Vegetables
Yogurt
Coffee
Tea

Figure

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  Fig. 1 Decisional criteria to determine dietary restriction between nurses and patients.

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  Fig. 2 Percent of allowed to eat by cooking type between nurses and patients.

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