N104: Essentials of Nursing Care - Health Safety

N104: Essentials of Nursing Care – Health Safety Study Guide Chapter One: The Nursing Process The nursing process is the scientific process that provides the basis for all nursing care. It is delivered by the nurse to the patient. Because the nursing process is closely tied to the scientific method, it provides a firm foundation for the delivery of a patient’s care. It is important to note that the nursing process: • Must be patient centered: Any plan of care is developed with the patient’s needs and problems as the central focus. • Is systematic and rational: The goal of the nursing process is to identify the patient’s healthcare status, build goals, and develop a plan around that status while delivering nursing interventions to move the patient towards the desiredgoal. • Is cyclical in nature: The nursing process consists of five steps that follow a logical sequence. The steps are interrelated and dependent on each other; therefore, the process only ends when the patient achieves the desired goal. The five steps in the nursing process are: assessment, diagnosis or analysis, planning, implementation or intervention, and evaluation. • Requires critical thinking skills: Within this defined process, the nurse has the freedom to solve the problem, make decisions, and utilize creative thinking to alter the nursing treatment course for the patient. As the condition of the patient changes, the patient’s plan must also change quickly. • Requires collaboration with the patient, the patient’s family, and other healthcare providers: Because the process allows immediate “course correction”, when the patient’s condition changes everyone on the team must be involved. The patient is the center of care and must be involved in the planning. The patient’s family will be involved, if that is the patient’s wish. The healthcare team, physicians, nurses, aides, therapists, and case managers, must work together to ensure that the plan makes sense and is moving the patient towards the agreed upon goals. • Is supported by the American Nurses Association and The Joint Commission: The goal is to provide a framework for nursing care of the patient in anyenvironment. • Must be based on a framework of ethical and legal standards: Care should follow the standards as defined by the Nurse Practice Act in each state. In order to apply the nursing process to the care of patients, the nurse must develop several core competencies. These include: • Interpersonal and communication skills that will allow the nurse to listen to the patient, family, and other team members, while being able to distill the information obtained and communicate the plans to all the members of the team. • Technical skills that will allow the nurse to perform nursing procedures using basic and advanced technologies andequipment. • Cognitive skills that will allow the nurse to quickly make decisions based on critical and creative problem-solving skills. The primary work of the nurse involves making accurate assessments, analyzing data, planning and implementing interventions, and evaluating outcomes. The steps of the nursing process are graphically represented in the figure below. The nursing process:

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