How are your bowel motions? The question nurses need to ask
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How are your bowel motions? The question nurses need to ask

Lynne Pearce Health journalist

Patients may be embarrassed to talk about it, but bowel problems affect quality of life. Advice on how to help patients, how to broach the subject, and options for addressing the problem

Bowel care is of great importance for a patient’s quality of life, yet many people are too embarrassed to discuss the subject. It’s a conversation that arguably needs to be had whatever the clinical setting: £168 million was spent by NHS England on treating constipation in 2018-19, the equivalent of funding 7,304 newly qualified nurses for a year.

Nursing Standard. 35, 9, 54-57. doi: 10.7748/ns.35.9.54.s19

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