Compassion in Nursing Essay

The increasing need for provision of quality healthcare in different parts of the globe has over the years enhanced the valuation of some of the basic nursing skills. As the primary caregivers in any health facility, nurses have to demonstrate different elements including care, compassion, and effective communication when providing essential services to patients such as eating and drinking. Notably, these requirements offer the necessary expertise that can help in not only improving their effectiveness but also enhancing their relations with their clients (UC Davis Transplant Center 2018, n.p). Demonstrating these rare elements in the workplace can be a hard task for these professional considering the different challenges they encounter in the course of their work. As such, this study will evaluate how both compassionate care and effective communication contribute positively to the nursing profession.

 The nursing is a challenging field that requires a proper understanding of the different approaches to employ when engaging patients. Notably, ailing individuals are from diverse cultures and comprehending their needs requires the development of distinct skills including effective communicating. Today nurses work to prevent diseases, promote proper health and to help patient to cope with some of their complications (Dempsey, Reilly and Buhlman 2014 p.148). When carrying out their tasks, they observe, react and record some of the symptoms displayed by these individuals.

Furthermore, these professionals collaborate with physicians to ensure, treatment and the administration of the various prescriptions are timely availed to patients. Nurses are constantly working in a changing environment that requires them to provide high-quality care continually and to demonstrate utmost professionalism in their work (McElroy and Esterhuizen 2017, p. 86). Due to their continuous interaction with both patients and doctors, they must develop and show skills in creating relationships with both parties to ease how they perform their work. As such, most of them take varying approaches that could help in demonstrating specific abilities including companionate care and effective communication (Newell and Jordan 2015, p.79).

Role of Nurse/ Nursing in Delivering Care

 Care delivery in nursing is a comprehensive concept that entails different varying aspects ranging from the ability of the nurse to plan their task effectively to creating proper relationships with their patients. Very patient wants to be treated well and to understand how knowledgeable, competent and skilled these professionals are in delivering high-quality care (Kings Collage London 2017, n.p). Effective care takes different dimensions including a positive approach to the mental, emotional and physical needs of the ailing individuals, effectiveness with compassion and humanity, safe and prompt interventions, patient empowerment, advocacy, and support as well as enhancing team spirit (Bernstein 2017, n.p).

 Notably, both patients and nurses share the same have different roles to play in ensuring proper and high-quality care is believed regardless of the challenges facing the institution. Demonstrating concern is a continuous process that starts with the ability of the nurses to understand their primary objectives and their responsibilities to different individuals in the facility including patients and physicians (Valenta et al. 2016, p.151). Considerably, the first step in demonstrating high-quality care is through developing a positive attitude towards their work. This aspect determines the approaches employed by nurses in not only offering care but also creating good relationships with the patients (Kings Collage London 2017, n.p). Empowering patient is also a good method of demonstrating the aspect of care in nursing. Notably, this aspect may take different dimensions including making them feel in control of their situation, creating interactive session models, being responsive to their needs and continuous support.

 Moreover, nurses can also demonstrate care in services such as eating and drinking through implementing safe and .prompt nursing interventions. Due to the complexity of their work, nurses are subject to errors that may lead to increased complications in care provision and general deterioration of the patient’s health. Some of the positive interventions that can aid in reducing such risks include mobility therapy, sleep pattern control, infection control, ensuring compliance with the diet, bed bound care, and energy conservation (Papathanasiou et al. 2015, p.48). Essentially, eating and drinking make up some of the important activities in the patient recovery process. It is therefore important for nurses to ensure that ailing persons stick to healthy meals that can promote their recovery and give them the energy to fight opportunistic infections. Other relevant and safe interventions include providing that the meals correspond to their culture, getting involved in all the steps of treatment, and engaging patients (Bernstein 2017, n.p). Modern nursing puts more emphasis on the understanding of patients’ beliefs and culture as it determines the approaches to employ in providing effective treatment methods. In other instances, nurses can demonstrate care through aspects such as teamwork and adopting evidence-based practice methods.

Compassion in Care Delivery

 Compassion in nursing entails the ability to offer care through the development of proper relationships and other aspects including respect, dignity, and empathy. Alternatively, it can also be demonstrated by the ability to show kindness and intelligence in offering care services in a health facility. Notably, this aspect plays a vital role in providing quality care in health facilities through reducing health problems and speeding the recovery process. Moreover, it is not shaped by one person but rather influenced by the environment nurses are subjected.

 In most instances, compassion in care delivery is considered one of the first principles in promoting proper and desirable ethics in nursing. It aids in enhancing connectivity and the experience to understand the suffering of others and evoking moral response to need to bring comfort to patients (UC Davis Transplant Center 2018, n.p). Due to their role as the front-line professionals tasked with ensuring the well-being of patients, compassionate care is deeply rooted in their daily operations. Moreover, this factor not only enhances nurses’ job satisfaction but also help in enhancing recovery among ailing individuals (Dempsey, Reilly and Buhlman 2014 p.148). As such these professionals can demonstrate compassion care through different practices including motivation, sensitivity, sympathy, distress tolerance, empathy and being non-judgmental.

 Motivation entails the urge for nurses to remain positive, helpful and supportive in everything they undertake. Nurses have the duty to encourage patients regardless of their condition and to ensure that patients feel confident about getting better (Zamanzadeh et al. 2018, p. 93). Through continuous support to patients by ensuring they take the prescribed meals and medicines as required, assisting them to walk or get out of bed by demonstrate high level of compassion. Sensitivity, on the other hand, involves the capacity to be open to attention and to notice that other people, especially ailing persons, require different forms of help and not shunning away from offering assistance. In essence, patients require different levels of attention, and by providing varying levels of support, nurses can help in creating proper relationships with them.

Nurses can also demonstrate compassionate care through understanding the cultures and beliefs of their patients. Most individuals consider faith and traditions to be an important factor in providing quality care (Christiansen et al. 2015, p. 34). This explains why most modern institutions require their health professionals to be conversant with cultures of the communities they serve to employ proper treatment mechanisms. Moreover, this aspect can also be demonstrated through developing proper and productive relationships with patients. Good relations may include constant interaction, checking up on them frequently, understanding their interests, taste and what they are passionate about as well as listening to them (Sullivan et al. 2016, p 209). Such factors help in developing trust and confidence between the two parties.

Effective Communication

 Proper communication in a health setting particularly between nurses and their patients, is one of the most essential components that help in providing quality care. Notably, it can be described as the cornerstone of developing proper relationships and understanding both cultures and needs in health facilities (Wright, 2012, n.p). Considering the scope of their work, nurses can demonstrate desirable communication element in different ways including active listening, not interrupting patients, utilizing different nonverbal communication methods, cultural awareness and voice control (Neese 2017, n.p).

 Voice management entails different aspects including accurate punctuation, appropriate intonation, and pitch of the sound used in communicating with patients. Notably, these aspects aid in not only maintaining proper rapport with ailing individuals but also ensures that an interactive environment is developed between the different parties (Kurtz, Draper and Silverman 2016, n.p). Proper management of voice will also encourage patients to be free and express their feelings on how they feel or what they expect from health professionals.

 Nurses can also demonstrate proper communication through cultural awareness. This aspect requires an overall understanding of the societal issues and beliefs that would, in turn, determine their interaction not only with the patients but also with their colleagues (Kurtz, Draper and Silverman 2016, n.p). Notably, cultural awareness entails understanding the proper approaches to employ in initiating treatment methods including being sensitive to their faith and traditions. This can help them to incorporate these aspects into the strategies they employ in offering care services. Moreover, this aspect can also be shown through the use of verbal communication skills that enhance the ability to apply workable strategies to increase interactive skills with their patients.

 Proper use of language creates a friendly environment that may, in turn, familiarize both parties with the different colloquialisms and euphemisms. Becoming familiar with the language also increases trust and interaction between the nurses and patients to inspire goal achievement and provision of quality healthcare (Allinson 2016, n.p). Equally, non-verbal skills can also be used to demonstrate proper communicative abilities. Since there exists a high level of diversity in healthcare, these abilities can be effective when dealing with disabled individuals including the deaf (Ogbeiwi 2018, p.9).

 The success in nurses showing communication abilities primarily depends on the patients’ readiness to learn, support, needs, preferences, concerns, and limitations (Bramhall 2014, p. 53). In offering services such as eating and drinking, the nurse must first communicate with patients on the importance of a proper diet on their condition and how it can be used to enhance the recovery process (Medline Plus 2018, n.p). Depending on their condition, an ailing individual can respond differently to the nurse’s social skills that may, in the long run, determine their association.

Skills Discussion

 Nurses have different roles in a health facility including maintaining patients’ records and attending to their needs, importantly, they use skills such as compassion for enhancing eating and drinking to their patients. In the modern hospitals, these health professionals use different strategies such as preparing and distributing patients’ drinks and foods, collecting meals in the wards, setting up bed tables and trays as a method of showing compassion to the ill individuals (Sellman 2017, p. 46). As such, nurses must have several skills for this initiative to be successful including nutrition skills, kindness, friendliness, and social skills including collaboration and team spirit (Weller, Boyd and Cumin 2014, p.151). These abilities would enable them to explain to their clients the effectiveness of proper health and to maintain contact to follow up on their progress even after being discharged.

The main essence of activities such as eating and drinking is that it may help the patient to not only maintain proper health but also to avoid the development of opportunistic diseases including diabetes. It also helps in avoiding weight loss, lack of energy, loss of appetite, poor concentration and the inability to perform specific tasks (Kurtz, Draper and Silverman 2016, n.p). As the primary caregivers to these individuals, nurses have to ensure they educate ailing persons on the importance of maintaining good health. As such, these professionals need to have specific communication skills including inspiring trust, active listening, cultural awareness and nonverbal communication such as body language and posture.

Conclusion

 Care, compassion and effective communication are some of the essential aspects of achieving quality services and nurturing productive relationships between nurses and patients. With the increased need for diversity and adoption of modern care methods in providing critical services, most of the health professionals have to accept this new trends and to make ailing individuals feel comfortable despite their complications. Equally, promoting healthy diets through drinking and eating can also utilize some of the different nursing skills including cultural awareness respect, nutritional abilities and caring. These expertise are part of the current strategies advocated in the nursing profession to promote professional development and to help them develop leadership roles and to be advocates of change.

References

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