Nursing and sexuality: integrative review of papers published by the Latin-American Journal of Nursing and Brazilian Journal of Nursing

Abstract

This study departs from the assumption that studies addressing sexuality in the field of nursing present changes and broaden the scope of discussion to include gender and sexual rights, although a strong tendency to link sexuality to its biological aspects is still observed. This study identifies the state-of-the-art of studies addressing sexuality published by two international journals: Latin American Journal of Nursing and The Brazilian Journal of Nursing. The sources were papers published in both periodicals over a period of ten years (from 1998 to 2007). In a universe of 1,894 searched abstracts, 29 mentioned the word ‘sexuality’. The results confirm this study’s assumption showing that the studies addressing sexuality from the perspective of nursing published by these two journals broaden the understanding on the subject as they incorporate categories such as gender, but also excessively link sexuality to its biological aspects.