Measuring nurses’ knowledge and awareness of climate change and climate associated diseases: Protocol for a systematic review of existing instruments (Preprint)

Abstract

Human activity has changed the planet’s climate and population health. Climate change has become a threat to human health, as have non-communicable and cardiovascular diseases. By 2050, climate change should cause about 250,000 additional deaths. There is an urgent need to promote more ecological thinking and health awareness through behavior and lifestyle changes, guided by the concept of eco-literacy.

Identify and evaluate the reliability, fidelity, and validity of instruments measuring nurses’ knowledge and awareness of climate change and climate-associated diseases.

A systematic literature review will retrieve and assess studies examining instruments measuring nurses’ knowledge and awareness of climate change and climate-associated diseases. Using predefined search terms for nurses, climate change, literacy, and scales or tools, we will search for published articles recorded in the following electronic databases, with no language or date restrictions, from their inception until October 31, 2023: Medline Ovid SP (from 1946), PubMed (NOT Medline[sb], from 1996), Embase.com (from 1947), CINAHL Ebesco (from 1937), the Cochrane Library Wiley (from 1992), Web of Science Core Collection (from 1900), the Trip Database (from 1997), JBI OVID SP (from 1998), and the GreenFILE EBSCO. We will also hand search the bibliographies of all the relevant articles and search for unpublished studies using Google Scholar, ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global, and DART-EUrpore.eu. This will be completed by exploring the gray literature in OpenGrey and the Grey Literature Report, from inception until October 31, 2023, in collaboration with a librarian. Twelve bibliographic databases will be searched for publications up to October 31, 2023. The papers selected will be assessed for their quality.

The electronic database searches were completed in April 2023. Retrieved articles are being screened, and the entire study is expected to be completed by October 2023. After removing duplicates, our search strategy has retrieved 3408 references.

This systematic review will provide specific knowledge about instruments to measure nurses’ knowledge, awareness, motivation, attitudes, behaviors, beliefs, skills, and competencies regarding climate change and climate-associated diseases.

CRD42023407696