Introduction:

Palliative care includes physical and psychic symptoms affecting the patients' quality of life. The need for awareness and surveillance of these symptoms, as well as the development of a suitable care plan, are part of a nursing professional's job.

Objective:

Evaluate the knowledge that nurses have about assessment and permanent surveillance of symptoms, the international scales used for this purpose, and the development of a palliative care plan upon evaluation of the symptoms.

Methods:

A survey was applied from July to September 2017 to 120 nurses selected by non-probability sampling in which inclusion and exclusion criteria were taken into account. Data analysis was based on tables and charts processed with the R software.

Results:

Only 12% reported having attended specific palliative care courses. Concerning general knowledge about palliative care, 77% provided a correct definition of palliative treatment. 67% were found to have poor knowledge about the subject, 18% reported having enough knowledge, and 10% said they had no knowledge.

Conclusions:

Positive results were obtained with regard to knowledge, but little information was detected about international scales, with a high dependence on doctors' opinions when taking decisions.

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