Glorious nursing care has all the time been equated with offering secure, applicable and compassionate patient-centered care. Embodying these qualities are a should for any nurse, and these rules have all the time been a trademark of nursing training.
Offering care requires a deep understanding and respect for the variations which will exist amongst sufferers, comparable to variations in look, gown, dietary habits, non secular practices and beliefs. It includes recognizing and valuing these variations to ship compassionate and personalised care that honors every affected person’s distinctive identification and experiences.
This work, pushed by the affect of social determinants of well being and the hyperlink between spirituality and higher outcomes, emphasizes dialogue, bridge-building and intercultural competence. By way of engaged instructing, I assist college students acknowledge, recognize and incorporate variations, fostering a deeper understanding of how these components affect affected person care.
To facilitate understanding of those points within the classroom, I designed an interactive puzzle to assist nursing college students embrace holistic, patient-centered care and be taught to understand the number of components that inform affected person’s lives and their well being care selections. Elements comparable to tradition, gender, neighborhood, religion and spirituality can considerably affect individuals’s well being and selections.
College students start the undertaking with a clean puzzle within the form of a human physique. Every week at school, as college students research the physique system, be taught to evaluate that system and observe on one another and mannequins, they acquire scientific data and expertise.
However scientific expertise alone aren’t sufficient to supply holistic care. College students want data, consolation and publicity to components that affect affected person care and determination making. After specializing in hands-on expertise, I work to assist nursing college students develop in intercultural competence and humility by incorporating studying about numerous cultures, eating regimen, gown, rituals, religion/spirituality practices and their affect on care. We search to grasp, for example, how a Sikh affected person’s head masking is rooted of their perception of modesty and desire for a similar intercourse well being care supplier. We discover Muslin sufferers’ desire for a pork-free eating regimen and which affected person inhabitants may be extra more likely to refuse blood merchandise, amongst different subjects. My objective is to problem college students’ preconceived assumptions and luxury ranges and encourage them to see issues by the affected person’s eyes.
The ultimate step within the puzzle undertaking is for college kids to “beautify” their puzzle to grasp that every affected person is way over the sum of their elements. By way of this undertaking, they not solely acquire a deeper understanding and consciousness of their friends and turn into extra related as a cohort, however they’re additionally left with tangible fashions representing intercultural consciousness and competency — the flexibility to grasp, respect, take care of and work properly with individuals from numerous backgrounds.
One other vital consider growing nursing college students’ intercultural competence is enhancing their religion/spiritually literacy, which takes heart stage in my Bridging Religion and Well being initiative. Together with colleagues from the Elon College non secular research division, this interdisciplinary initiative brings collectively pre-licensure nursing, doctor assistant and bodily remedy college students (in addition to their college and employees) to discover and focus on the affect of religion, faith and spirituality on holistic affected person care and well being outcomes. Over three weeks, members discover modules that cowl the significance of religion in care, the function of spirituality in supporting sufferers’ non secular wants and insights from non secular leaders on offering care.
By way of interactive dialogue, case research, panel discussions and evidenced based-practice, college students construct religiosity data, communication expertise and consciousness to raised assist sufferers who incorporate religion, spirituality and/or faith into their well being care decision-making. For instance, in a case research that explored finish of life rituals, college students mentioned how they may honor a affected person’s needs that the deceased stay untouched, intact (no organ donation) and unmoved for a interval in at the moment’s fast-paced inpatient hospital setting the place mattress area is proscribed. Upon completion of the collection, college students earned a micro-credential on Religion and Well being literacy whereas constructing bridges to raised holistic, individualized patient-centered care.
All through each time period, I always return to my guiding query: What does wonderful nursing care appear like and the way can I educate nursing college students to ship this care? To me, it’s patient-centered and holistic care — care that takes cultural consciousness and spirituality into consideration, is compassionate and evidenced-based. In different phrases, wonderful nursing care is delivered by an rising nurse who understands, acknowledges and appreciates that delivering care by the affected person’s eyes can flip a life round.
Elon College Assistant Professor of Nursing Jeanmarie Koonts, MSN, CNE, has held quite a lot of scientific and educational positions all through her skilled profession. By way of dialogue, bridge-building and engaged instructing methods, she strives to assist college students acknowledge, recognize and incorporate the variations they expertise to raised serve their sufferers.
