Nurses’ attitudes and beliefs towards provision of Sexual Health Care to in-patients: A cross-sectional study of the South Rift, Kenya

Sexual health forms an essential domain of human health and wellness and significantly contributes to the quality of life for people of all ages. It is integral to holistic patient care but often neglected by health providers including nurses in routine practice. Guided by the Donabedian model, this study examined how nurses’ attitudes and beliefs influence provision of sexual health care to in-patients in the South Rift, Kenya A cross-sectional study design was employed and the Sexual Attitudes and Beliefs Survey (SABS) was adopted to collect data from a sample of 171 nurses working in medical and surgical units of selected level four and five hospitals. Data analysis was done using descriptive statistics together with chi-square test to determine the relationships between independent and dependent variables. The P-values were set at <0.05. Necessary ethical clearances were sought from relevant authorities during the study. The results showed 65% of nurses provided sexual health care satisfactorily to their patients with a statistically significant relationship between nurses’ attitudes and beliefs and provision of such care(Ⅹ2=79.271, p-value =0.016). Nurses’ attitudes and beliefs towards sexual matters greatly determine how nurses care for patients with sexual health care needs during hospitalization. It is recommended that hospitals should train nurses on sexual health care through Continuous Professional Development programs while nursing schools include practical aspects of the attitude domain in pre-service training curricular to empower nurses on sexual health matters.