Teamwork And Culturally Sensitive Care In Nursing

Goal 1: Teamwork in nursing

This paper will critically reflect on my two goals: the importance of incorporating teamwork in nursing and dealing with culturally sensitive care in nursing.

My goal here was to improve my skills in teamwork by perfecting my interpersonal skills and appreciating the role of other professionals when delivering efficient patient care. I planned to achieve this goal during the first six weeks of my clinical rotation. To evaluate the achievement of this goal is to constantly check on the improvement of my patients based on the roles delegated to me.

Learning needs: In our nursing profession, teamwork is critical when managing our patients (72:61-6). To manage some patients, we need to employ a holistic approach and integrate other professions to achieve our goal of efficient patient care. Teamwork also helps to prevent low staff morale and promote social cohesion. I have never really practiced teamwork; therefore, it is an area that I need to improve on. My learning need here is to learn how to work with other professionals through the integration of roles and improve my interpersonal skills.

Learning activities: to achieve my goal, I needed to work on some of the learning activities I needed to attend ward rounds. A ward round is very important as it helps you appreciate the role of different professionals when delivering patient care. Teamwork is also evident here through the delegation of roles to different professionals. My role as a nurse is to administer medication and act as a bridge between the patient and the physician. Another learning activity is to rotate to different departments with different nursing roles such as surgical wards, medical wards, etc.

Timelines: I believe I will have perfected my teamwork skills within the first 4 weeks of my clinical rotation.

During my practice in the maternity ward, we had to employ teamwork. The team comprised of a doctor, a nutritionist, and nurses. If the patient had other issues, we had to call other professionals such as psychology counsellors, dietitians, cardiac surgery team, etc. I was thrilled to be part of this team. Teamwork and collaboration are essential in quality patient care. My goal is to improve my teamwork skills such as effective open communication, handling conflict proactively, and practicing leadership.

I learned how to relate well with every team member and do my part by accomplishing the tasks allocated to me. We had meetings regularly and ward rounds to review the patients as a team. I had to sharpen my communication skills. Without effective communication, patient care would not be effective, and there would be very many challenges. This is because a nurse acts as a bridge between the patient and the physician.

Learning needs

As a nurse, I learned how to relate well with the patient to identify if the treatment is effective. If not, I had to relay the information to the physicians to take action as soon as possible. The physician would either change the medication or the dosage, which would help promote the patient’s well-being and save lives.

I also had to sharpen my organizational skills as a nurse. I had to plan my schedule prior and carry out my tasks in an organized manner. As a nurse, I cannot afford to make mistakes since they could be fatal and cost human life. I also had to document every task that I performed. This was written in the Cadex and my nursing notes. My duties included allocating different medications and filling in the charts for patient management.

Critical thinking was also important in my practice. I had to apply critical thinking skills when handling patients’ problems or when we had unforeseen challenges. When things got out of hand, I remained calm and composed and judged situations appropriately. I also learned stress management techniques and applied them in various situations such as heavy workloads, distractions, and multiple tasks.

Interprofessional care occurs when various healthcare professionals work together to achieve the goal of patient care. This promotes collaboration and teamwork. I worked with other healthcare professionals such as physicians and dietitians in maternity. My role was to assist in personal care, make observations, and allocate medication. I also closely monitored blood pressure, temperature, heart rate, and respiratory rate. I also had to bear in mind my professional limitations; therefore, I only did what was in the line of my practice. Working alongside the professional team guided me through my patient care.

I evaluated my goal achievement by assessing if my patient was improving and comfortable. The main challenge that I faced was time constraints. Sometimes, I lacked time to interact with other professionals in my team due to my busy schedule. I did not learn a lot from them, but I always did my best. I always found that my patients’ health had improved in my shifts. At the end of it all, I achieved my goal of integrating a holistic approach to patient care. I have also achieved my goal of being a responsible team player.

My goal here was to identify the effect of culture on efficient patient care in nursing.

Learning activities

Learning needs: In nursing, we provide care to all patients regardless of their cultural backgrounds. To manage our patients effectively, we should recognize differences and similarities in our perceptions and cultural backgrounds (13(3):271-80). Nurses must understand their culture as well as the patient’s culture. Sometimes, we fail to identify cultural biases, especially when the nurse and the patient share a common culture. By understanding a culture, we will determine what is acceptable to our patients and improve the effectiveness of treatment. Cultures are very diverse. My learning need here is to be culturally competent when dealing with patients.

Learning activities: Learn how to perform a cultural competence self-assessment.

Avoid language barriers by improving communication between the patient and the health care provider.

Timeline: I should achieve this goal within the first two weeks of my clinical rotation.

During my practice in maternity, I encountered a Muslim woman as a patient, and I had to care for her. According to her culture, women should cover their heads or wear a ‘hijab’ in front of their male family members. I noticed her wearing her ‘hijab’ when going outside, even though sometimes it was physically inconvenient for her, especially when she would breastfeed her newborn.

I also noticed other cultural differences, such as when her husband failed to go with her to the delivery room. She later explained that only females could accompany a pregnant woman to the labor ward. During our patient care, we had to respect the cultural differences and do what was acceptable according to her culture. Failure to do this, the patient would not have accepted our services.

When offering patient care services to this patient, we had to change several things to do what was acceptable according to her culture. First, Muslim women prefer to be treated by female healthcare professionals. Therefore, we had to incorporate this and ensure that the doctors and nurses taking care of her were female. It would even be more acceptable if we had female Muslim doctors and nurses at the moment. From this experience, I learned that we should never neglect these cultural practices because they are critical to the members of that culture.

In this scenario, we achieved interprofessional care by promoting collaboration and teamwork. As a nurse, I had to be sensitive and adaptive to patients’ cultural differences. With the healthcare provider’s team, we had to understand our patients’ culturally and religiously acceptable treatments. We also had to find out if various medical procedures were acceptable.

When integrating professional care for this patient, we had to practice cultural competence. Most times, I paired my patient with doctors and nurses of the same culture, and they had to be of the female gender. The patient care offered had to be culturally acceptable.

From this experience, I learned that we should respect the cultural backgrounds of our patients and the choices they make. We should also be culturally sensitive so that we do not do what is culturally unacceptable to our patients in our line of profession. Promoting stereotypes is also not acceptable when taking care of patients from other cultural backgrounds. I also learned that it is essential to have cultural knowledge of our patients and avoid being judgmental based on their beliefs.

I achieved my goal by practicing cultural competence by pairing my patient with nurses or physicians of the same culture. Doing this promoted smooth patient care, and the patient was satisfied. This is because the patient’s needs are understood and addressed. I achieved a positive patient outcome as a nurse.

References

Relji? NM, Pajnkihar M, Fekonja Z. Self-reflection during first clinical practice: The experiences of nursing students. Nurse education today. 2019 Jan 1;72:61-6.

Gustafsson C, Fagerberg I. Reflection, the way to professional development?. Journal of Clinical Nursing. 2004 Mar;13(3):271-80.