Conducting an evidence-based practice is one of the most efficient and at the same time complicated tasks for a nursing specialist, seeing how it presupposes that the best possible practice guidelines should be established for a particular clinical problem, as Hood (2010, p. 267) explains. It is important that an interdisciplinary health team should work on a particular problem to address it properly, which demands impressive skills and a considerable effort. In other words, they require that meta synthesis should be carried out.
In my personal experience of nursing, I am going to use the evidence-based practice approach as well to solve complex health issues in some of my patients. As Hood stresses, there are several ways to practice an evidence-based approach. In the U.S., Hood stresses, the key approach is the so-called National Guideline Clearinghouse (NGC), which synthesizes the latest researches to produce the ultimate evidence-based clinical practice guidelines. Personally, I would give my preference to the given evidence-based practice guideline. Hough being rather blurry, it still provides a decent account of the latest research and enables a nursing specialist to figure out the course of further actions to address a particular problem.
Other nurses prefer to utilize the approach suggested by the AHRQ, which incorporates the data acquired from the researches on a large variety of topics, including ulcers (Gorecki, Brown, Nelson, Briggs, Schoonhoven, Dealey, Defloor, & Nixon, 2009), urinary dysfunctions, pain, depression, etc. While the given approach can also be considered rather efficient, it fails to embrace every possible sphere of healthcare, which makes it useless in situations when none of its material corresponds to the field in which the problem has been detected.
While the significance of both the AND-prepared and BSN -prepared nurses’ effort is equally huge and each of the two groups contributes vastly to the improvement of healthcare services, as well as safety of the patients, there are a number of differences between the two, especially concerning the scope of nursing activities. While AND-prepared staff is more focused on their patients’ physical and psychological development, BSN-prepared staff is more concerned about the outside factors that affect their patients’ development (Hood, 2010, p. 19). By using the BSN approach, I will be capable of providing more adequate services to the patients, not only addressing their personal issues but also helping the patients restore their ties to their families and community (Holmes, 2011, p. 36).
To be more exact, I will manage to develop more complex approaches towards solving the patients’ problems by using a set of improved communication skills. It will also become possible to define complex interactive nursing diagnoses, therefore, making the link between the patient and the community even stronger, as Hood (2010, p. 19) explains. In addition, I will be able to incorporate the ideas voiced by the authors of nursing research into the strategies that I will develop for my patients. Moreover, it will be possible to account for my own practices to other nurses with sufficient education and expertise level.
Though previously being left in the shadows, knowledge management and new skill acquisition is strongly emphasized in the present-day nursing practice; moreover, it is demanded that nurses should be aware of the latest innovations, which may possibly help them improve the quality of their services even better. Though admittedly a highly complicated task, it can be handled by adopting an adequate strategy. By choosing a theory that his/her choices will be based on, a nurse can develop a consistent and comprehensive approach towards his/her patients and be able to predict the results of particular actions, therefore, making sure that the treatment methods used in the process of therapy are not going to backfire.
In my personal practice, I am going to use several theories to base my decisions on. By combining several approaches, I will be able to come up with an objective and adequate solution to a specific problem. To be more exact, I am going to use the theory developed by Neuman and known as Neuman’s health care system model (Hood, 2010, p. 132). The choice of the theory was predetermined by the fact that I am capable of visualizing the ways in which nursing theories can strengthen the patient’s flexible line of defenses (Neuman Systems Model, n. d.).
Health insurance is doubtlessly an important step in taking good care of one’s health, seeing how it allows getting fast and efficient medical help in case of accidents. However, according to recent reports, quite a few U.S. citizens lack healthcare insurance. To be more exact, the 2011 Census showed that nearly 48.6 million the USA citizens did not have health insurance (Income, poverty, and health insurance coverage in the United States: 2011, 2012). Therefore, encouraging health awareness among the residents of the USA is the top priority of any healthcare specialist.
At present, it is crucial, that more people should be aware of the benefits that health insurance provides and the risks that it helps avoid. In addition, as teachers, nurses should encourage awareness of the most common diseases, as well as the means to avoid these diseases and to define the symptoms, not to mention the fact that nurses must encourage regular health examinations among the U.S. population. By accepting their professional accountability (Hood, 2012, p. 306), nurses will be able to improve the current statistics on diseases prevention in communities.
References
Gorecki, C., Brown, J. M., Nelson, E. A., Briggs, M., Schoonhoven, L., Dealey, C., Defloor, T., & Nixon, J. (2009). Impact of pressure ulcers on quality of life in older patients: A systematic review. Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, 57(7), pp. 1175-1182.
Holmes, A. M. (2011). Transforming education. Nursing Management, 42(4), pp. 34–38.
Hood, L. J. (2010). Leddy & Pepper’s conceptual bases of professional nursing. Philadelphia, PA: Woltzers Kluwer/Lippincott, Williams, & Watkins.
Income, poverty and health insurance coverage in the United States: 2011 (2012). Web.
Neuman Systems Model (n. d.). Web.