NR 351 Discussion iCARE Self-Assessment 1
NR 351 Discussion iCARE Self-Assessment 1
NR 351 Discussion iCARE Self-Assessment 1
One area of the iCare assessment that I completed shows that I need improvement in taking time for myself as a student and as a nurse. I think that it is very important, especially in nursing, for you to take time for yourself to avoid burnout. Nursing is a very challenging career, yet also very rewarding at times. RN Network’s 2017 study on nurse burnout surveyed over 600 professionals and determined that nearly half of nurses working in the United States have considered leaving the field (Nursing.org, 2019). I think many nurses leave the field because of lack of self care. Nurses work 12+ hour shifts, easily leading to physical and emotional fatigue. It is very important to realize signs and symptoms of burn out like irritability, exhaustion, and frequently calling in sick. Hospitals offer employee assistance programs for nurses that include free phone counseling sessions, or other forms of stress management and self-care support (Nursing.org, 2019). I think that hospitals offering these types of resources for employees really shows that they value their staff, thus, helping them avoid burnout as well. Sleep and self-care renew your energy and let you be more effective in your other activities (Hood, 2017).
In my leadership role as a BSN, I plan to be alert to other nurses who may be exhibiting burnout symptoms. Recognizing these and offering up help to these nurses could help curb the burnout rate. A lot of nursing supervisors and leaders are so busy dealing with different internal aspects of the hospital, they often forget to check on the mental state of floor nurses and make sure they are able to effectively do their job.
During my time in the BSN program, I would expect my instructors to demonstrate care for students by timely feedback via email/phone. I think that online instructors have a duty to uphold and that is effective and timely communication. It is hard to be able to ask questions about assignments when there is a 48 hour window that you may be waiting for a response. I also think that demonstrating care should be done through constructive criticism and not through simply deducting points. I think that we are all here to learn and giving feedback and helping students improve versus letting their grade continually suffer.
References:
Avoiding Burnout as a Nurse. (2019, June 11). Retrieved March 9, 2020, from https://www.nursing.org/resources/nurse-burnout/#battling-burnout-for-nurses
Hood, Lucy. (2017) Leddy & Pepper’s Professional Nursing, 9th Edition. [VitalSource Bookshelf]. Retrieved from https://online.vitalsource.com/#/books/9781496351388Links to an external site.
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In taking the iCARE Self-Assessment, I came to recognize that I have area to improve in taking time to care for myself in the work, home and school settings. In nursing professionalism, it is on that individual to understand the duties and responsibilities that come with being a nurse and one of these duties is to understand and acknowledge the relationship between self-care and taking care of one’s self in order to be able to provide quality care consistently and at its best (Massachusetts Nurse of the Future Nursing Core Competencies, 2016). A study was done which involved nursing students being tested to evaluate the correlation between having a developed self-care identity and level of care which they were providing. Conclusions to this study showed that nurses who valued their own health and met their self-care needs were 1, able to provide quality care to their patients on a consistent basis, and 2, were able to develop good coping skills or were less likely to develop negative coping skills when placed in stressful situations (Meadows, 1998).
I will work to plan time management ahead versus week-by-week now that I have added school into the mix. I also think this week’s assignment on time management will help me see clearer my dedicated time for school and work that time into my work schedules, family’s schedules, and time I make for myself.
I would like my instructors to show they care by encouraging me, guiding me and always being available to help if needed or as suggested in our text, “caring as an interpersonal interaction” (Hood, p. 24). I already have consistently felt that that my instructors encourage me and give me positive feedback and respect my thoughts in discussion boards.
Massachusetts Nurse of the Future Nursing Core Competencies: Registered Nurse. (Revised March 2016). Retrieved from https://www.mass.edu/nahi/documents/NOFRNCompetencies_updated_March2016.pdf
Meadows, Lois Casden. (May 1998). Integrating self-care into nursing education. Journal of Nursing Education, Vol 37, 225-227. https://search-proquest-com.chamberlainuniversity.idm.oclc.org/docview/203939384?accountid=147674
Hood, Lucy. (2017). Leddy & Pepper’s Professional Nursing, 9th Edition. [Vitalsource Bookshelf]. Retrieved from https://online.vitalsource.com/#/books/9781496351388/cfi/6/24!/4/2/462/4/4@0:94.6
It is too funny that we have the same weakness when it comes to taking time out for ourselves. I think that as women, a lot of times we get so wrapped up in taking care of everyone else that we forget about ourselves. As a mom, time becomes an issue. When the end of the day comes, we usually are too tired to think about ourselves. I think that the study you found on the degree of self care nursing students have versus the care they were able to give is so accurate! I know that if I force myself to exercise and take care of myself, I feel refreshed when I go into work and feel like the day flows a lot better.
What are some things you like to do for self care? I enjoy getting my hair done every few months, if I can. I also enjoy working out, fishing, and spending any and all extra time I have outdoors (weather permitting of course). I do not like the Michigan winter so next winter we plan on moving to Florida!
I agree that self-care should be taught in nursing education. Somehow most nurses feel that we need to be all-giving and that it is selfish to think of ourselves. Our readings this week gives us great examples of how we are unable to give if we are “half full” ourselves. Hopefully, the time management plan is helpful in planning out your weeks ahead. We know things happen to alter the plan at times. Be sure to plan something that is for yourself at least once a week. At least you live on a beautiful island! Good use of your APA formatting. In your references, the name of your journal and volume number or the book needs to be in italics.
It is so simple sometimes to forget that something as simple as taking care of ourselves can have such an impact on our care. Our bodies are one of our biggest tools and like any tool must remember to treat with care and maintenance. Some thing that helps me relax when I get home, and thoughts of work and the nights events keep playing trough my head is to meditate. A simple app I downloaded and just 15 minutes dose wonders. I also love your idea of time managing farther ahead rather than week by week. I love monthly calendars as they allow me to see a much broader aspect of due dates and appointments. I enjoyed reading your discussion.
One area from the iCare Self-Assessment that I have significant opportunity for improvement during my BSN program is to take time and care for myself in the workplace. The Massachusetts Nurse of the Future Nursing core competencies states that an accountable nurse “recognizes the relationship between personal health, self-care, resilience and the ability to deliver sustained quality care” (Massachusetts Nurse of the Future Nursing Core Competencies, 2016, p. 16). I often find myself scrambling trying to do everything for my patients. Skipping bathroom breaks, missing lunch to add more charting here and more patient care there, leaving me burnt out at the end of my shift. I am truly blessed to work with a great team of nurses, but being a brand-new nurse, can be intimidating at times. I am often trying to prove to them and myself that I too can be a great nurse. However, I am starting to learn that I am just one person and cannot do everything by myself and healthcare is a team effort. One of the hardest things that I am still trying to overcome since becoming a nurse is delegation. Hood describes the process of delegation as assigning a task, that is in their scope of practice, to another so long as they are capable and knowledgeable to do so and owning responsibility and accountability (Hood, 2017). To create more time to take care of myself in the workplace I plan to increase my practice of delegation with each shift. By utilizing delegation, I can still provide great care but also give me a little more time for myself whether it’s to eat or just take a few minutes to breathe. I have found that the more that I delegate the more time that I must critically think. I have also found that delegation has made our team stronger. In the article Delegation of Authority, delegation is stated to be a process that develops through experience and education and improves with accumulated skills, experience and critical thinking (Ashley, 2018). When an aid is rusty or has never performed a certain task before, we go in and do it together. This has led to nursing aids feeling more confident in their tasks and in some instances lead to conversations and looking up policies in which I even learned something new.
The best way for an instructor to demonstrate care for me can be as simple as being straightforward and clear in assignments, task and discussion questions. I tend to overthink and can stress on what the question is truly asking me. Keep questions simple and straight forward clears up a lot of anxiety for me with assignments.
Resources
Ashley, T. R. M. C. I., & Smith, N. R. M. C. (2018). Delegation of Authority: Delegating Tasks to Assistive Healthcare Personnel. CINAHL Nursing Guide. Retrieved from https://eds-a-ebscohost-com.chamberlainuniversity.idm.oclc.org/eds/detail/detail?vid=6&sid=8bfdeec7-d54b-48eb-97cb-96758e3b2e6d%40sdc-v-sessmgr03&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWRzLWxpdmUmc2NvcGU9c2l0ZQ%3d%3d#db=nup&AN=T707423Links to an external site.
Hood, Lucy. (2017) Leddy & Pepper’s Professional Nursing, 9th Edition. [VitalSource Bookshelf]. Retrieved from https://online.vitalsource.com/#/books/9781496351388Links to an external site.
Massachusetts Nurse of the Future Nursing Core Competencies: Registered Nurse. (Revised March 2016). Retrieved from http://www.mass.edu/nahi/documents/NOFRNCompetencies_updated_March2016.pdfLinks to an external site.
I too am a new nurse and find that I have some of the same struggles as you do. I am not sure exactly how new you are, but I just graduated in December. I began my job February 10th. I am in the ICU, so there is a lot of critical thinking, but I have a smaller patient load. I have did a lot of thinking and talking with my husband about nurses that will miss lunch breaks and never take time to sit and re-group their thoughts. I had started to get into that habit of missing my lunch and skipping the bathroom so that I could tend to another patient. I started to get very burned out after just a couple shifts of doing that. I understand that sometimes, it may not be feasible to take as long of a break as you are assigned, but I have found that I HAVE to take a break. I am doing my patients a disservice by not taking a break and I think that’s how you should look at it too. If you were your own patient in the hospital, you would definitely want your nurse to take a break to eat, use the restroom, and gather his/her thoughts. This would mean that if something were to change drastically in your health and you needed to call a rapid response or code, you would have your witts about you to be able to think through the situation. I think its very important that you make sure you at least get a few minutes everyday.
What do you do for self-care outside of work? I enjoy being outside every chance I can and the occasional hair day!