Nurses' Attitudes, Practices, and Barriers to Assessing Symptoms of Discomfort in Mechanically Ventilated Patients: A Cross-Sectional Study.

Nurses were aware of the importance of using scales to assess the discomfort symptoms experienced by mechanically ventilated patients. However, except for pain, most nurses did not routinely use scales to assess discomfort symptoms. Barriers to routine discomfort symptom assessment included the lack of an assessment culture and the lack of knowledge of the assessment scales. Clinicians should be educated regarding the existence of validated rating scales and develop additional rating scales utilizable for minor discomforts in mechanically ventilated patients.