Introduction: Sexuality is a part of human life and it affects the life quality of an individual. Many women experience sexual dysfunction during gynecological cancer treatment, which can affect their relationship. The nurse has an important role to play in informing the patient and partner about changes in sexuality, but barriers often arise that prevent this topic from being addressed. Purpose: The purpose of the thesis is to investigate the impact of sexual intercourse on relationships with a partner, the role of the nurse in sexual health counseling and barriers that limit or even prevent the treatment of sexuality as an important life activity from a nursing perspective. Methods: We used a descriptive method of work with literature review, which we searched between January 2017 and December 2019. The search was performed in the literature databases CINAHL, Medline and Academic Search Complete. The literature was searched in English with the keywords: sexuality, gynecological cancer, nurse, barriers, cancer, sexual dysfunction, cancer patients, nursing, health care professionals, discussion, separately and using the AND logical operator. In Slovene: spolnost, ginekološki rak, medicinska sestra, ovire, rak, spolna disfunkcija, diskusija, rakavi bolniki, zdravstvena nega in zdravstveni delavci. Results: Genital cancer and its treatment has a great impact on women's sexuality from several aspects (physical, mental, social), which also affects the relationship with a partner. Despite the awareness of nurses that sexuality is an important topic in the nursing care of a patient with genital cancer, it rarely happens that they talk about it. The most common reason for non-treatment of sexuality by a nurse, is that they do not have the appropriate knowledge. Discussion and conclusion: A large percentage of sick women do not receive adequate information from health professionals about the side effects of treatment on sexual health and this often leads to problems in partnerships, because neither women nor partners know how to deal with the problems. The treatment of the couple by the nurse is very important. Unfortunately, such treatments are very rare, and the reasons for this are: lack of time, discomfort when talking about sexuality, fear of a negative reaction from the patient or co-workers, inadequate knowledge and their own beliefs and belief that the patient is not interested in sexuality during the illness.
|
