Foundations of Nursing - Assignment Example

Foundations of Nursing 1. Paradigm is a framework that contains the accepted views on a subject, structure of the direction which the research should take and even how it should be performed. It can also be defined as the theoretical or philosophical framework of a discipline or scientific school within which laws, theories and generalizations and the research performed in their support are formulated. 2. There are four concepts from the nursing Meta paradigm. These include person, environment, health and nursing. Person concept can be defined as the recipient of care which includes spiritual, psychological, and physical and socio cultural components. This concept also involves the individuals, family or community. Environment concept is defined as external and internal conditions that surround the patient. It also involves the circumstances and the influences affecting the person. Health as a concept can be defined as the degree of wellness or illness that is experienced by the person or patient. Nursing is the characteristics, actions and attributes of the nurse or person giving the care to patients. 3. Simultaneity paradigm is the theory that underpins humans to be unitary or unpredictable, indivisible and ever changing and always in mutual process with universe. It is consistent with human science as opposite to natural science. It views a person as unitary being in who is in a continuous, mutual interaction that is simultaneous with the environment. 4. Totality paradigm is the theory that assumed reality exists independent of any knower; this reality is composed of separate building blocks that are possibly related which can be combined in myriad ways to form entities. This theory views human beings as the sum of psychological, biological, spiritual and sociological variables. It also views health as a continuum from the illness to wellness as a stimuli adaptation or ability of self care. Totality paradigm nurses make judgments on health in comparison with norms that are predefined. In simple terms, totality paradigms usually see a person as an organism whose nature is composite of spiritual and bio-psycho-social dimensions. A person has to interact and manipulate with the environment so as to achieve goals and be able to maintain health which is usually viewed as bio-psycho-social dynamic state and the balance. 5. Both simultaneity and totality paradigm focuses on the health of a person. They try to convince the importance of maintaining a good health. Both paradigms utilize the concept of maintaining good health to support the work of nurses and other social workers so as to help people have health in their bodies. They are theories that try to evaluate the health conditions and redefining them in various perspectives. They both share assumptions, views and also values of phenomena that are addressed in nursing field. Both go hand in hand in that, if one of the theories dominates and discovers any challenge within it, then the logic of other paradigms scientific revolution is likely to arise. They both evaluate on various environmental factors both internal and external that determine the health issues on any person or human being. 6. In contrast with totality paradigm, the simultaneity paradigm is a more radical view of social work of the world. Simultaneity paradigm differs with totality paradigm in three ways, which included its assumptions about health and person, in relation to social care goal and the implications for practice and research. Simultaneity paradigm views health as being described by an individual and hence can only be described by an individual. It goes ahead to say that there is no optimum health. It argues that health is how a person experiences person living. As for the totality paradigm, health is maintained by the person after the interaction and manipulation of the environment so as to maintain it. Health is viewed as how the surrounding or the environment is like. Simultaneity paradigm views a person as different from and even more than the sum of their parts whereby the totality paradigm sees the person as organism whose nature is bio-psycho-social and spiritual dimensions composite. Health is viewed by simultaneity as process of becoming that one who that is while the totality paradigm is the absence of disease, or optimum well being. It is something that can be attained, maintained and keep it to be functioning. Health according to simultaneity paradigm is described by a person who is living the life and it is what is in him while according to totality paradigm, health is something which can be altered, fixed or even made better for other people and it is based on the environment situation. 7. There are four carper's ways of knowing. They include the empirical knowing, personal knowing, ethical or moral knowledge and aesthetic knowing. Empirical knowledge is the knowledge that is verifiable publicly, objective and research and factual based. It is usually found in literature, books and research, or even evidence that is obtained by indirect or direct measurement and observation. Personal knowledge is subjective and requires self awareness as well as incorporating and promoting holism and respect in relationship between nurse and patient. It arises both as empathy and sympathy and understanding. Ethical or moral knowledge is about the systems of believe that are expressed through the ethical decision making and moral codes. Nurses usually have to make choices between interventions that are competing and even make judgments which are considerable and based on quality debate and information. Aesthetic knowledge is art of nursing about how much you do something and even why. Aesthetic knowledge incorporates and links all other three ways of knowing. It is usually individual, subjective and unique involving interpretation, intuition, creativity, valuing, empathy and understanding. In a case where one is mentoring a student who has had grief, empirical knowledge may be around when they can have off duty, the process of grief and your counseling skills. You will have personal knowledge or experience of grief and observe how people of different types react. You empathize but at the same time controlling the unhappiness so as to help them. Ethical knowledge may lead to insisting for the student to get time off due to their distress level that is affecting them. One may also be required to inform the manager on why they are not on duty. The aesthetic knowledge allows somebody to treat people individually and even use caring skills you have to comfort and support them. 8. The carper's knowledge helps us to know how to know the environment effects and how we can interrelate with it to make our life's better. Totality paradigm sees human as being shaped by the effect cause relationship with the universe. Personal knowledge is important in knowing bio-psycho-social spiritual aspects. 9. Totality paradigm highlights on the things that are existing already and do not require any knowledge for one to perform them. Personal knowledge and other carper's empirical ways of knowing insist that it is important for one to know what surrounds him or her so as to be able to know how to tackle problems and how to live well. 10. Criteria of measuring a profession were developed by Francis Galton who is also referred to as father of anthropometric intelligence. He also included mental tests in his anthropometric measures. 11. The main criteria for a profession include an academic qualification which is the type of qualification that shows the exact level and type of education gained by someone. It may be a degree in law, teaching, theological and medical degree from institute, college or university. Specialized and expert knowledge in the field where one is practicing professional are also one of the criteria. This can be defined to the knowledge that one has gained from practicing in his or her field after a period of time. Another criterion is excellent practical or manual and literary skills, which are related to the profession. Fourth criteria are high quality work in areas of creations, services, products, consultancy, primary research, administrative, presentations, marketing and other work endeavors. For one to qualify to be a profession, he has to produce quality job or work so as to prove he is able. The fifth criteria are a high standard of professional ethics, work activities and behavior while carrying the duties or one's profession either as self employed person, career, employee, company, associate or enterprise. A profession must give the customer quality work, build confidence in the client. The client should also not be chased away for not being able to remunerate professional work. The last criterion is reasonable work motivation and moral. Having a desire and also interest of doing a job well and also holding an attitude that is positive towards profession are very vital in attaining professionalism of high level. 12. Kuhn's philosophy describes that the profession develops through one being able experience through his career or work after a certain period of time and develop the tactics required as well as mastering them. According to Kuhn's philosophy, one actually develops the skills for his profession after training for a certain period of time where skills develop, and he is able to master them better. 13. According to Kuhn's philosophy, nursing profession develops after a certain period of time where the nurse is able to learn various aspects from the work. After interactive process with patients, the nurse is able to gain several skills and gain some knowledge where he is able to know more about his profession. He is able to grow professionally according to Kuhn. 14. Quantitative research is the systematic empirical investigation of properties that are quantitative and phenomena and even their relationships. It is usually used in social sciences like anthropology, sociology and political science. It is usually done with an objective of developing and employing the mathematical theories, models and hypotheses that pertain to phenomena. This research is usually made using scientific methods that include models, hypotheses and models. It also includes development of instruments and measurement methods. Experimental control and variables manipulation is also included. It usually used to gather quantitative data or information dealing with numbers and anything measurable. It is used in measuring the way people imagine, act or feel in a particular manner. 15. Objective data are the facts that are measurable and observable by the clinician or nurse. Objective data are usually preferred for the experiments. Obtaining objective data is costly and time consuming. Objective data sources can be divided into three categories which include, direct objective measurement of user, directly recorded data which resulted from the actions of the user and registered by the investigator or by other means like video recording, and data that are measured directly from product during trial or after completion. Subjective data are obtained easily, inexpensively and quickly. It generally gives a direct ways for assessing the opinion and preference of the user. The methods usually used in subjective measurement are ranking methods, questionnaire, interviews, rating and checklists. Subjective data collection is the process in which data that relates to problems of the patients are obtained from the patient. The data are retrieved or gotten from patient's event description other than the physical examination that provides objective data. 16. Simultaneity paradigm usually goes hand in hand with subjective data because according to simultaneity paradigm, humans cannot be reduced to parts but is usually seen as unitary or whole. 17. Totality paradigm is well associated with objective data which usually sees human as a sum of parts. In totality paradigm, the data are usually measurable where such kind of data is referred to as objective data Read More