Nursing interventions to cover patients' basic needs in the intensive care context - A systematic review.

Only adult ICU patients and relatives were included, so findings do not apply to children or adolescents. The interventions, outcomes and designs were very heterogeneous, so the authors could not pool results in a meta-analysis. Many studies were at high risk of bias, especially for blinding of participants and personnel, and several had problems with randomisation or allocation concealment. The content of many interventions was poorly described, so it is not possible to tell which nursing component produced any effect. Few interventions used a theoretical framework. The review included trials where nurses delivered or assisted care alongside usual medical treatment, so the independent contribution of nursing cannot be separated from other ICU care.

Do not conclude that nurse-led ICU interventions reliably improve patient or family outcomes. Trials were heterogeneous, many were at high risk of bias, and several complex programmes found no benefit, so positive results may reflect particular components or settings rather than nursing care in general.