Exploring Healthcare Staff’s Attitudes and Perceptions of Robot Use in Nursing Care in Germany

摘要

Abstract The nursing profession is characterized by above-average levels of mental and physical stress, with employees complaining in particular about time pressure and high work intensification. The use of robots is being discussed to reduce nurses’ workloads. Four focus groups were held with a total of 17 participants. The evaluation was carried out using qualitative content analysis. Several constitutive aspects of nursing work were discussed. These are the complexity of nursing work, intuitive perception and decision-making, continuous observation of the patient, and a claim for good nursing care that requires empathy. As conditions for the use of robots, the aspects of preventing harm to patients, the condition of the patients and the necessity of adapting work processes were discussed. Several aspects of nursing work can be seen as factors influencing the use of robots and the development of robots for nursing. They can inform the development of socio-technical arrangements including robots in professional nursing.