This essay is a reflection of my placement that I recentely undertook at the Princess Royal University Hospital that is under the able guidance of the King’s College Hospital. The essay will deeply analyze the episode that took place while I was involved in a community placement by the university.
I was a part of a 60 hour long placement at the hospital and had the opportunity to closely work with elderly patients in the Respiratory ward. The episode of care that I have undertaken will comprise of analysis that have been drawn using appropriate models and policies of health care.
The paper will further delve into details of ethical parameters and legal factors that could have an implication upon the patients care. Patient safety along with risk assessment is another factor that will be examined in the course of the essay.
As a supervised nurse I shall also be analyzing the responsibilities and the roles that have been bestowed upon me and the impact that it will have on my career as a student nurse. The paper will also provide recommendations upon the case study that has been taken into consideration.
The patient in my case study will be referred to Mrs. X, so that we can maintain the patient’s confidentiality so that I am in accordance to the NMC Code of Professional Conduct and ensure that the patient’s privacy and best interests are maintained.
According to the NMC guidelines it is imperative that as a student nurse or a health care professional it is essential to provide complete protection for any confidential information that pertains to the patient that is under your care (Nmc.org.uk, 2017).
It is the main duty and responsibility of the health care provider and professional to ensure that all the information corresponding to the patient is solely used for confidential purpose and is not misused in any way.
The main purpose of our placement at Princess Royal University hospital as a student nurse helps students to further enhance their knowledge in skills specifically in the area of management and leading others thus preparing them for their roles as qualified nursing professional.
During the 60hrs of placement at the hospital I had the opportunity and the chance to hone my skills and be in direct contact with my patients care routines and at the same time even handle a few complex patient cases.
Whilst my placement there was one particular scenario that deeply had an impact upon. Mrs. X was an 85 year old patient that was admitted in the elderly patients ward. The patient was fit to be discharged by the hospital as she was medically fit, however the social services did not deem her fit to be discharged as they were not happy with her being sent away to her home.
This was due to the fact that her son did not seem to provide her with was in accordance to the standards of care as per the social services. The services had at numerous incidents witnessed along with me that Mrs. X had problems with communicating as her speech was slightly slurred due to a previous stroke attack and her mobility was also severed due to which carrying out her daily tasks was a herculean task for her.
I also noticed that the patient only ate when we were around and not her son. The relationship between her and her son was a bit strained as I also saw that there was no communication even while feeding her he would forcefully put food down her mouth. However as a student nurse it was my duty to report the incident to the other nurses to bring to their concern.
On further finding out I came to know that the patient was a retired nurse herself and had problems with her son who had a criminal track record. The patient was not being provided the appropriate care whilst she was in his company. The son also told us that due to the immense amount of property that his mother had, he did not want social services to intervene. He did not want all her money to be spent in providing the needed care for her.
However as for the best interests of the patient we contact the social workers when they came in to see the patient and assisted us that action would be taken. A meeting with the board was taken up and the now the patient has three care providers coming in at different times to provide the needed care.
This particular episode was handled in a very effective manner and the problems that the patient was facing were analyzed and a risk assessment was also carried out to sort out the issue. The patient was provided with care providers and a multi disciplinary team was set to help provide the needed aid for care delivery for the patient.
Thus helping me to understand the importance of care delivery. It was patient centric and the most essential component was working as an integrated team for the best interests of the patient in concern (Parnell, 2014).
The paper will provide an analysis on how important self awareness is and how it can be used in having a very assertive approach for handling appropriate patient care. The most essential component of management is having self awareness. As a nurse it is our prime role to ensure that the care that is provided to patients is of the highest standards and helps in enhancing the knowledge and skills of the health care provide as well.
It is imperative to have a complete management of one’s own behaviors that we as nurses can develop therapeutically relationships with the patients (Borkowski, 2015). Having knowledge about self awareness helps in strengthen beliefs, thoughts and coming over any kind of bias and understanding the impact that they can have upon the services that are being provided to the patients.
In order to develop good therapeutic relationships with patients it is essential to have all the knowledge about cultures, beliefs and values at the same time focusing upon ones own strengths along with limitations thus helping to provide the patients with good care.
As per the Hierarchy of Needs Theory that has been provided by Maslow it is essential to have understanding of self actualization as it helps in enhancing the potential of an individual yet at the same time provides a sense of accomplishment and fulfillment (Kelly and Tazbir, 2014).
As a nurse we need to be complete aware of our own limitations and our key areas of strength so that we can work on the strengths to further strengthen them and the limitations so that they can be dealt with (Ellis and Hartley, 2001).
Providing patients with care requires knowledge and management that is effective in nature. Thus leadership skills are needed, hence for all nurses it is imperative to be able to plan and deliver the appropriate care for all the patients. Hence management of these roles and responsibilities is vital and essential for the success of the organization.
The paper is also analyzing the theory of learning and reflection that has been provided by David Kolb. This learning model was first established in the year 1984 and works on two essential levels. It comprises of a 4 stage learning cycle along with four different styles of learning and reflecting (DeCoux, 1990).
The theory mainly emphasizes upon the internal cognitive process of learning of the learner. The first stage is the concrete experience where when an individual comes across a new situation, the reflection observation stage where reflection upon the scenario gives rise to understanding of the inconsistencies that exist.
The third stage is the abstract conceptualization where reflecting upon the scenario can help in developing new ideas and modifying the earlier existing ones and the last stage is that of active experimentation where application of the learning process is carried out (Weiss and Tappen, 2011).
Only when an individual goes through these four stages of the cycle that effective learning can take place. As nurses reflecting upon our actions is imperative for providing excellence in health care services.
The placement has provided me an opportunity to learn and further enhance my knowledge of the skills that I have and the areas that need to be improved upon. In the case that was presented above it is pivotal that all hospitals have a social services team on board to deal with such cases that need strict action to be taken for the betterment of the patients care and health.
I would like to extend my gratitude to the hospital for allowing us to go through these experiences as overcome my short comings as a nurse to provide the best health care services to my patients. This experience provided me the ability to work upon my short falls and overcome my own limitations and biases.