Reflection is considered as a method that can help us learn to comprehend and develop the practice (Patterson et al., 2016, pp.94-98). It gives one an opportunity to explore and discuss experiences with a view of attaining good comprehension to gain knowledge. This essay will assist me to explore my individual experience as a learner from higher education access in college and university level. It shows my interest and love for nursing journey began and the challenges I experienced during my practice. It has discussed in details my situations with the aim of giving insight into how health care support works, how clinical experiences can be tackled professionally from my past working experience, working in a multi-Disciplinary Team as a health care support worker and the values that have been added in my experience as a health practitioner. This essay is divided into three parts that encompass the introduction, body, and conclusion drawn from summarizing the main information discussed in the piece. The remaining part covers three work-related situations, and it is fashioned after Gibbs reflection model. The next section making up the body of this essay is divided into two, the first one discusses my journey into the nursing practice through health and human science course accessibility and the degree in the university that has played a role in my experiences and has helped in shaping some competencies required to be a competent nurse in future. The second section discusses my work associated situations and how based nursing four domains skills of competencies were applied in the work-based case.
Nursing practice in the United Kingdom is regulated by the Nursing and Midwifery Councils regulations. The standards are set up for training, the rule of conduct and educating and also performance nurses are required to abide by in making decisions at work that is associated to both vulnerable victims and the public (Peachey & Meradin, 2010 ). Nurses are expected to work within the scope of NMC regulations and rules (Dekker, 2016). Those who work against the provisions risk facing both legal and ethical effects of the actions.
Professional values
My transformation into nursing through the passage of health care support worker acted as a response to a long maturity craving to take care of all vulnerable individuals who are in need. I always see nursing as the answer to serving humanity which is my passion. This assisted me to take up health and social care and nursing program so that I can help many people in the community that require assistance in regards to their health. These passages have always assisted me to learn from medical and social module of dealing with problems regarding health (Husebø, O’Regan and Nestel 2015, pp.368-375).Moreover, medical module view disability as a big problem that belongs to people with disabilities while the social view acknowledges the step as a barrier with the belief that the society is not improving individuals with disability by not making enough facilities required to assist individuals who are vulnerable(Lestander, Lehto and Engström2016, pp.219-224).Effective and clear communication is part of good record keeping, and it is crucial in the care continuity and support the delivery of service to the individuals who are in need(Wilson, D. and Miller 2018.p.59).
This part of the reflective essay puts its focus on professional values in the workplace context. It also focuses on my personal experience as a health care support worker looking into the issue of patient safety. The safety of the patient aims to prevent avoidable errors and sufferer harm(Hall, Johnson, Watt, Tsipa and O’Connor 2016, p.e0159015).Nurses are expected to be accountable for the patients and safety of the public throughout their occupation. The professional nursing competence aspect is chosen because of the broadening concern about the safety of the sufferers in the United Kingdom. There have been reports like Sir Francis reportshow the poor patient safety occurrences in the UK.Also, other reports have shown that there is inadequate and unsafe care responsible for many causalities within the NHS yearly (Wong, Etchells, Kuper, Levinson, and Shojania 2010, pp.1425-1439.). The concern of the victim’s safety recorded in the reports had to do with treatment error, patients falling, and inability to detect abuse and safeguard patient (Graban, M., 2011). Although there have been measures taken to improve the safety of the patient, current reports indicate that there is still poor patient safety in the United Kingdom (Valentine, Nembhard, and Edmondson 2015, pp.e16-e30). This made me decide to work and improve the safety of the patient and select it as a topic for this reflective essay.This reflection assisted me to reflect on my nursing experiences with a view of assessing my practice as a nurse. These experiences have helped me in promoting the quality of life and focus on improving the vulnerable individuals in the future. Quality and safety of the patient have always been my priority since I joined the university to study nursing. This reflection has reminded me that as healthcare professionals, we devote our profession to serve the sufferers. In addition, I have focused on the critical desired competencies through the formation in academics, training, and practice. I will forever devote myself to help individuals who are vulnerable in the community. Patient safety is paramount at this point in our lives.
Communication and interpersonal skills
During my practice, the whole surgery team encompassing the surgeon, bedside nurse, and other medics, conducted a 15-minute daily briefing at every sufferer’s bedside. The presentation is led by a nurse practitioner who is followed by a structured communication protocol developed by an expert in human factor science. This briefing always ensured that the patient is safe and any arising issue is solved immediately without delay. The process ensures that the patients care plan is developed and recapped. I also had an opportunity to review the progress of the patient and requirements and also to clarify the roles of the team. I also educated Sufferers and family members about the process in advance, and I encouraged them to participate actively by stating their concerns. Through this action, the participation of the patients and family members increased each day tremendously. This helped in improving the quality of life of the patient. To promote medication safety, the pharmacist reads the medications scheduled for the day and have a chance to address any query raised by the patient family or the care team.
As a team, we addressed anything that has gone wrong in the care process called system glitches rather than mistakes to encourage their identities and avoid the individual blame stigma. System glitches are documented, the patterns identified and necessary solutions provided. As a team, we also participated in biweekly system rounds that give a forum for discussing the goals of the team and progress and for addressing the concerns of the system levels. This process helped me take care of the patients advance and ensuring that their family members are comfortable at all times. Furthermore, NMC (2010) codes expect nurses to use excellent communication and interpersonal skills. They have to work with service users to get the information that is needed to make reasonable adjustments that enhance optimum health and enable equal access to services if someone has a disability. The made me be confident and dare to take up responsibilities in working with other experts such as the pharmacists, physiotherapists doctors, and occupational therapists to successfully evaluate patients and give necessary guidance to ensure that they are safe. This procedure also taught me that knowing the information about the patient early enough is paramount in medication.
Nursing practice and decision making
Gibbs reflective cycle helped me to learn from my experience in health facilities that I worked during my practice. Another incident that showed patient safety occurred while working in a stroke ward when I was working with one of the health care in the United Kingdom as a support worker during my practice in the community sanatorium. I worked with a victim who had a hearing impairment. I was sent by my department to cover a shift that began at 5 pm on Monday. When I arrived, the staff on duty introduced me to a sufferer Mrs. McMahon, a 66-year-old woman with a right hand affected by the stroke and also had a hearing impairment. I was given information that she uses hearing aids and that she had not eaten the whole day and always feeling withdrawn in regards to her moody nature. In this situation, I asked the assistant some queries since the assistant was with Mrs. McMahon the whole day since I was interacting with the sufferer directly. This assisted me to get more information about the sufferer so that I can provide quality care since successful handing over duties help in improving the health of the patient and also quick recovery (NMC2010).
After some time, I started observing that Mrs. McMahon was trying to have a communication with me using the body and sign language. After some time, discovered that the patient had difficulties because the batteries in her hearing aid had ran out of power. I came to the understanding that this was the reason why she withdrew herself from other individuals and refused to eat. The Royal College of Nursing indicates that health care experts need to take measures to provide solutions that can help in solving issues of sufferers with hearing impairments by both speaking slowly and listening carefully (Peachey & Meradin, 2010). This means that words are supposed to be pronounced in a way that the sufferer can read your lips in order to have a communication. In some situations, using communication aids like a hearing aid or written communication might be embraced. I later realized that my first concern was to check Mrs. McMahon’s hearing aid where I realized that it was out of power. The need to make sure that the sufferer is safe compelled me to go beyond the information given to me by the medic that handed over to me in my shift. This situation helped me to realize that Mrs. McMahon had a problem with the hearing aid. I wouldn’t have known that if I had assumed that Mrs. McMahon was just moody for no apparent reason. This could have put the sufferer in danger since poor communication can lead to inappropriate medication. The NMC (2010) was candid about what represents a secure connection that the regulatory body expects to be safe, respectful and compassionate. This encompasses embracing different strategies to make sure that successful communication takes place so that there is a better relationship between the sufferer and the patient to enhance quality care.
Leadership, management and team working
In addition, this essay has covered leadership, team working and Management domain of practice in nursing. Leadership, management and team working are explained as directing, planning, organizing and controlling of work done by groups in healthcare facilities in the Multidisciplinary Team encompassing doctors, psychologists, social workers, nurses, and other health experts. Team development is essential in attaining quality health care service through steps like norming, performing and storming.
To achieve patient care, teamwork is needed and the cooperation from other health workers. My experience at St. Johns Healthcare where I worked as healthcare as a subordinate for seven months made me experience leadership and management issues in the healthcare sector. The management was democratic because it provided opportunities for the team members to express themselves and offer opinions that might help in improving the quality of life. Some of the healthcare facilities have the autocratic type of leadership hence making it difficult to provide direction for both teams when they are working together.
I felt the need to change the perceptions of the team and embrace peace so that they can work together to serve the patient. A development model was put to effect in order to bring both groups together and work in unity to enhance the safety of the patient. Therefore, both sides were introduced to each other. This stage is identified as forming (Oliveira et al. 2015, pp.104-113). This stage allows the team members to know themselves whereby the duties are assigned. The team members worked effectively though there were trust issues because they didn’t know each other very well. At this stage, the team members can take time to know each other and interact and communicate efficaciously in the work setting. Effective communication and management are required to make sure that the quality care of the patient is invariable.
The following stage is storming. This happens when the members of the team try to do the allocated work by giving different ideas that might conflict. I observed that there was friction through the exchange of ideas. The various groups had different concepts such as organizational culture. The culture at St. Johns healthcare forbids dressing of the bed during the feeding period to avoid cross-contamination while the other team does not even care about that. The other team’s organizational culture is fluid as far as the visiting time for the patient is concerned. The visiting time for St. Johns is fixed. These parts of conflicts affected successful communication and teamwork required to dismiss evidence-based care for the sufferer. I also observed that the forming stage was not done adequately. A proper discussion needs to be conducted at the forming period to prevent these kinds of conflict in the future so that there can be the efficient delivery of services to the victims. Successful teamwork is essential in enhancing the quality of healthcare.
Performing is the last stage in the development process of the group (Gittell, Beswick, Goldmann and Wallack 2015, pp.116-125). At this point, the team can see their mistakes and performed the tasks that they were allocated. They also have a chance to learn from their mistakes from the storming time that is often defined by power struggle and conflict. This is the stage whereby the teams follows all the rules and regulations and carry out their tasks in a discipline which provides them with an opportunity to serve the vulnerable people and enhance patient safety. Moreover, new rules and regulations were put in place by the new management that provided solutions to the challenges that almost made the team collapse. This is important to the team because it assisted it to advance in its activities and embrace ethical codes for interacting with the NMC (2010).
Additionally, I also had an issue in communicating verbally and non-verbally with other members. The problem of communication has been dramatically affected teamwork in the context of healthcare. When team members work together, it enhances the quality of healthcare. I was able to overcome this challenge by being able to prioritize my workload which made me deal with experiences that are on demand that can endanger the safety of the sufferer. Patient safety is essential because it improves the quality of life.
Conclusion
This essay has stipulated the dimensions of the professional nursing competencies brought by the NMC. In addition, this reflection on professional and personal progress from being a learner to a nursing student who is competent. It has assisted me in realizing that the safety and the interests of the patients come first before anything else. Also, it has shaped me in decision making in order to give evidence-based care that concurs with the NMC code (2010). It has relatively equipped me with the kind of knowledge that I needed in order to work well with the multidisciplinary team to make sure that the sufferers’ safety and a successful way of communicating with other health practitioners to improve the quality of life. I have the confidence that I needed because of my experience and also enough knowledge that will help me to work well in the multidisciplinary team as a nurse. I have faith that these competencies explained in this essay enhance my professional development as a nurse in the future.
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