Healthcare Providers: Benner Practice Analysis - Essay Example

? Benner Practice Analysis Paper Mary Frey NUR 315 26th, October, Benner Practice Analysis Paper Identifying “boundaries” in caringis a major problem to healthcare providers. In this context, the boundary refers to the invisible line that differentiates between a professional practitioner and a family member. Family caregivers (child, spouse, friend, or relative) often become so involved in caring or vice versa that it might result into conflict and compromise mutual understanding (Pabst, 2011). A worst scenario may arise when the professional caregivers assume the role of the family caregiver. This paper will, therefore, discuss the function of caring in nursing and responsibilities of caregivers. Benner's Model emphasizes a differentiated practice that promotes achievements through a systematic progression. The paper will apply Benner’s model and Dreyfus’ model to reflect on my nursing profession. The paper will focus on appreciation of value through self-empowerment and professional relationships and networks. Functions of Caring In Nursing Caring Caring is the fundamental aspect of nursing. However, there is a slight variation in the mode and length of caring hence, the requirement for specialized training and experience. Throughout my practice, I have acquired relevant skills and experience that I find useful in my practice. Comforting and giving hope to patients is my first priority. Some of the health issue such as terminal illness, old age, some mental disorders, and physical disabilities cannot be solved through medication. In addition, some of the conditions take long time to be treated. In both situations, the patients have the right to receive care and dignity while undergoing treatment and therapies. Continued practice has enabled me to acquire specialized skills in comforting patients. Firstly, I always let the patient to know that they are worth living and acknowledge that they are not the only people with such problems. Thus, my basic approach in care giving is helping patients to rebuild their self-esteem. I achieve the objective by assisting the patient to re-discover themselves besides their immediate condition. Self-discovery enables the patient to determine their value and reason for life. Teaching and Coaching The second aspect of caring is a trainer or a teacher to the patient. As a skillful caregiver, I have realized that the wellbeing of a patient is dependent on the decisions made by the caregiver. In addition, patients rely on the nurse as their sole source of information and instruction. Being a caregiver requires you to be a role model and a point of reference. For instance, you cannot take a patient through regular exercise while you are not willing or able to exercise. Throughout my practice, I have successfully encouraged my patents to comply with the prescribed therapy. I have also been successful in promoting healthy lifestyles among the patients. Lastly, I am always considerate about the information that I pass to the clients through effective communication and interpretations. Counseling As a caregiver, I am also expected to be a counselor. This is useful in helping the patients to cope with stressful psychological or social issues arising from their condition. Experience in nursing has enabled me to acquire useful tactics to help patients cope with stressful situations. Firstly, I am concerned about offering intellectual and psychological support to the clients. Empowering clients through intellectual and psychological support enables the clients regain control over their lives. I also have outstanding skills in offering psychological support to my clients. I consider myself gifted in the area due to the positive results that I have always received. In the first stage of intellectual and psychological support, I always encourage the clients to develop new attitudes about their life. On a scale of 1-10, I can comfortably achieve a score of 8 points in promoting intellectual growth. Finally, I always encourage my patient to develop alternative behaviors and develop a new sense of control. Throughout my practice, I have achieved success rates that are above 70% in promoting behavior change among my patients. This success is attributed to my mode of training or relationship with the client, which focuses on strategic achievement of objectives. Although I have been successful in counseling, I need to improve my flexibility. Through my practice I have realized that different clients require different approach in counseling and hence, the need for diversity. Change Agent Patients are required to make various changes in their life or adapt to new ways of living. As a nurse, I am expected to facilitate the change process by offering guidance to the patient. Patients are also expected to make changes in their way of life in order to cope with their medical condition or therapy. Throughout my practice, I always educate my patients on the need to make change. I consider change as a factor necessary for survival or success. Thus, I encourage my patients to appreciate change in order to achieve success in their lives and recovery. To initiate the process, I usually encourage the patients to value change or the needs to adopt. I have always been successful in initiating change among my clients through guidance and encouragement. Firstly, I always consider myself part of the change. That is I walk with the client through the process of change. This aspect has enabled me to acquire significant level of success in initiating change among my clients. Although I have been successful in facilitating change among my clients, I face challenges resulting from involvement with family caregivers. I am often tempted to make decisions on behalf of a client, which is against our ethics. Client Advocate Clients have rights, which need to be protected despite their medical condition. A caregiver is expected to promote what is best for the client by ensuring their needs and rights are secured. In addition, the client requires having knowledge on their basic human rights and protection provided for by the constitution. Although I am not a trained lawyer, I have basic knowledge on legal proceedings and human rights. I also have an understanding of legal implications on palliative care and rights to life. Thus, I am in a better position to advice my clients on the best decision according to the country’s constitution and available medical option. Coupled with my training in human medicine and healthcare, I am able to advice my clients on making the best decisions. I am also conversant with available legal and medical alternatives that best fits the client. I consider myself a successful advocate since I always measure the suitability of a decision before advocating it among my clients. I have an inherent element of measure that enables me to weigh the suitability of available alternatives. Although I have enjoyed significant success in advocacy, I lack qualifications to practice law in the country. Secondly, I am not a firm decision maker and family caregivers often make me to compromise my decisions. Manager Management is a significant aspect of caring that determines success rate of recovery among patients. I consider management instrumental in the practice since it enables me to utilize limited resources. Nurses often encounter constraints due to lack of effective utilization of available resources. In addition, mismanagement can result in underdevelopment and unsatisfying results. My profound academic background and experience in caring has enabled me to be in a better position in terms of management. I consider efficiency as the best rationale or measure of proficiency in management. I consider myself an effective manager since I am able to utilize available and limited recourses to achieve outstanding results. For instance effective time management enables me to serve more than one client and at the same time conduct my duties at our centre. Secondly, I have the ability to make logical decisions and direct my clients accordingly. I have also achieved high caliber performance in monitoring the progress of a client in relation to their psychological and medical status. Lastly, I consider fair judgment and offering of rewards as an instrumental aspect of management. I always give appraisal to my clients for outstanding progress or performances. I also warn them against negative trends by giving them absolute information about possible outcomes. Although I have been a proficient manager, I consider my management practices deficient. For instance, I have always had difficulties in time management due to over-caring. I often cross the professional boundary due to over caring. In addition, I often get involved in family caring making me compromise my professional ethics. Researcher Successful caregivers are expected to be researchers at their own level. I consider this dimension to be a critical aspect of my practice. For instance, I am expected to establish the best therapy for my clients and monitor the impacts of different therapies on patients. This practice is essential for the welfare of the client and the science fraternity. It is evident that different people react differently to various therapies and medication and, hence the need for continued study. Thus, caregivers are expected to participate in scientific and consumer research to establish the best practices. I consider myself a proficient researcher since I am able to work and produce independent results. I am also a keen observer and I have high interests in advancement of knowledge. In addition, I have outstanding skills in research language, designs, and data analysis. Lastly, I am always concerned with human rights, research limitations and the need to observe ethical issues in any study. Although I have enjoyed significant success as a researcher, I am often inclined towards quantitative research methods. This does not blend well with the field, since caring is a social science and hence, the need for qualitative approach. In most cases, I am inclined towards analytical methods, which rely on statistics and probability. Strengths and Weaknesses Strength Nursing is a practical science that incorporates a high degree of corporation between healthcare providers and patients. Throughout my practice I consider theoretical knowledge instrumental to caring and hence a major factor in my practice. I have profound theoretical basis acquired from quality education that I have received in medical school. Equipped with the concrete theoretical understanding of nursing, I am able to solve real problems arising in my practice. A concrete theoretical understanding of caring has enabled me to undertake challenging tasks thereby, improving my experience. Experience in the field has enabled me to offer specialized care to my clients. I consider the ability to provide specialized care to the client a fundamental aspect of caring. Unlike other professionals in the field, I consider my practice a calling rather than a career. Therefore, I am, more concerned with the wellbeing of my clients rather than the financial rewards that I receive from my employers. Ability to distinguish between life and money has enabled me to become an outstanding caregiver. This allows me to meet the needs of my clients without overstepping my professional regulations and ethics. The need to offer outstanding care to clients has forced me to outsource the required knowledge and skills. In addition, taking extreme assignments has enabled me to outgrow the element of fear associated with care giving. I also believe in the inability of humans to control life and death. I am also a firm believer of the roles and responsibility of medical professions particularly nurses in improving or managing the quality of life. This has greatly improved my confidence and optimism in caring. Weakness Throughout my practice, I have often been struggling with achieving high standards organization. Organization involves optimal allocation of resources to provide a systematic solution to available problems. Effective organization is determined by the ability to withstand constraints that are present in our practice. Although I have a profound understanding of effective organization, I have not been able to achieve a high score in management. Therefore, I consider myself an insufficient organizer and, hence the need for improvement. Dreyfus model advocate formal instruction as the most significant aspect of skill acquisition. To improve on organization, I have identified various factors that lead to poor performance. Lack of delegation and boundary between professional and family caring is the main source of my poor performance. I consider the article “Care giving and Nursing Care: Where are the Boundaries?” by Margery Pabst as a source of motivation. The author of the article considers lack of a solid boundary between professional caregiver and family caregivers as the main source of poor organization among nurses. As a professional caregiver, I am required to manage or organize the clients and their family members. Family members have an advantage over a professional caregiver due to their established relationship with the client (Pabst, 2011). In most cases, the family members understand the needs of the clients better than the nurse does. To bridge the gap between professional and family caregivers, I am required to delegate or assign duties to the family members. According to Pabst (2011), some nurses are not able to take the responsibility or are overwhelmed by the family caregiver leading to a reversal of responsibilities. In such case the nurse often find him or herself been assigned duties by the family caregiver. In a worst-case scenario, a professional can be forced to assume the role of a family caregiver due to been over involved with a patient. Alternatively, a caregiver can be tempted to make decisions for a client leading to conflicts. Professional Goals I look forward to have a successful and fruitful career. In addition, I am concerned about my performance and clients who will have benefited from my practice. To develop my organizational skills, I will need to improve on my leadership skills. I will also need to consider family caregivers as my personal assistants and not instructors. Thus, I will need to assign duties to them according to my professional training. Summary Caregivers have various expectations and responsibilities that define their performance. Throughout their practice, caregivers are expected to be care providers, teachers or trainers, counselors, change agents, managers and researchers. I consider my nursing profession a success since I am able to meet at least 60% of each of these caring dimensions. However, I consider myself an insufficient organizer and, hence, the need for improvement. I have outstanding scores in caring and, this often compromise my organizational skills and responsibilities. In order to overcome my weaknesses, I will need to improve on my leadership skills and observe my professional boundaries and ethics. Thus, I need to assign duties to family members instead of taking duties from them. Conclusion Care giving is a field of nursing that involves providing specialized care to clients outside a health organization. Although caring is an instrumental aspect of nursing, it is a source of major ethical dilemmas. Inability of nurses to define concrete boundaries between family and professional caring is a major source of deprived organizational skills. Organization affects nearly all dimensions of nursing professions and, hence the need for concern. As a skilled caregiver, I am often faced with dilemma due to over involvement of family caregivers in my practice. Strength and weakness are basic characteristics or determinants of success in nursing. Thus, a nurse is expected to rely on his or her element of strength to solve arising weakness. Effective management is a basic recipe of success in nursing and caring, since it is a basic element of the seven dimensions of caring. Reference Pabst, M. (2011). Caregiving and nursing care: Where are the boundaries? Retrieved October 26, 2012 from http://www.nursetogether.com/Career/Career-Article/itemId/2193/Caregiving-So-Where-are-the-Boundaries.aspx#.UIt0FGd16nA Read More