Definition And Philosophy Of Nursing

For centuries the development of nursing knowledge has been influenced by numerous theorists and their respective theories. These theories have influenced, and continue to influence, nursing education, practice and research. (Johnson & Webber, 2005)

This author’s personal philosophy in practice is to provide holistic care to my patients and their families. This author feels that encompassing the whole family or the patients support framework in the plan of care is the best approach to returning the patient to their optimum state of health. It is important to this author to evaluate the all of the aspects of the patient’s lives that they will share. It is important to evaluate the patient’s learning style,

The nursing profession has shifted away from caring for the ill and has focused its attention on health promotion. The nursing profession has disassociated from such notions as the “handmaiden” persona to a profession that can stand apart. The implications of this shift on the healthcare profession, and the patient itself was evaluated. This shift occurred when nurses attempted to define, legitimatize, and increase the social standing of nurses. Many nursing organizations have defined the competencies of nursing to centre around education, research, and policy, however they have failed to mention the patient or their illness. This article gives an enlightened view of the nursing profession and provides a further understanding of the history

When people think about nurses, many ideas come to mind. They think of the hideous old starched, white uniforms, a doctor’s handmaiden, the sexy or naughty nurse, or a torturer. The media and society have manipulated the identity and role of nurses. None of these ideas truly portray nurses and what they do. Nurses are with the patients more than the doctors. People do not realize how little they will encounter the doctor in the hospital until they are actually in the hospital. People quickly realize how important nurses are. Because nurses interact with their patients constantly, nurses are the ones who know the patients best.

My definition of nursing is that of someone who genuinely cares about the well-being of others and helps heal those who are ill. Nursing is both an art and a science because in order to understand a patients diagnosis you must know the pathophysiology and basic lab values. The science part of nursing allows us to make judgments on medication orders doctors prescribe, procedures, and practices. Art is also apart of nursing because as nurses we must have intuition, compassion, and warmth towards our patients. It is what allows us to therapeutically communicate with our patients. A person can have the science part, but not master the art and therefore, that person may be uncompassionate towards a patient. I have see nurses in clinical settings

A nursing philosophy is the thoughts and beliefs about the job of a nurse based on one’s values. My values that have formed over the years have influenced me to purse a forever career as a nurse. I grew up in a small town Smithfield, Pennsylvania with my parents and younger brother. My community consisted of close relationships between the residents. Every one helped and cared for one another when needed. The practices of my community guided me to want to become a nurse. I want to continue to care for my community and give back to them by treating their illnesses and providing them with better health care. I am particularly interested in caring for pediatric patients. My goal is to try to provide every infant a chance to live their beautiful life created for them by God. While doing this, the primary focus of being a nurse will be to accommodate my patients and allow them to become a healthy person again.

While it may seem that Jesuit Pedagogy value is a traditionally catholic faith approach, it is merely the wording that disguises the universality of the value. Saint Ignatius and a community of university students founded the Society of Jesus known as Jesuits. In his search to become closer to God, he created a retreat filled with prayers, fasting, education and community, which we might now consider a movement. On the surface this probably does not seem to incorporate what a nurse might endure, but I find that it does. It is using large foreign words to describe the ability to teach and learn from one another, which a nurse will encounter many mutual teaching moments often involving critical information. The nurse can help build and bridge society/community of healthcare workers the patient can feel they can trust also becoming that patient’s advocate.

Philosophy is a set of ideas, values, and beliefs behind what a person does (Merriam- Webster Dictionary, 2015). All nurses have beliefs about what nursing is and is not. It is important to stay true to one’s personal, moral, and ethical values at all times. Nurses are morally and ethically responsible for their patients, decisions, and actions (Lindh, Barbosa, Berg, & Severinsson, 2010). Every nurse brings something different to healthcare because they have different philosophies and/or believe in different nursing theories that guide their practice.

To understand nursing philosophy, you must first understand what nursing means to you as an individual. To me nursing as well as nursing philosophy involves providing individualized holistic care to a patient, family, community, or even one’s own self. Holistic care is providing care involving the mind, body, spirit, and environment.

Nursing goes beyond caring for a patient during their illness and managing their disease process. Nursing includes adapting to a patient’s and their family’s physical, social, spiritual, environmental and psychological needs. I believe in treating the whole patient and being supportive of the family’s needs as well. Shelly & Miller (2006) asserts “while critical thinking, decision-making, and leadership skills are extremely important, the characteristics nurses need most are compassion, competence, faith, integrity and responsibility” (p. 291).

Nurses that listen to their patients, not only notice that they are physically hurt, but they can also notice their emotional wounds. The empathy of knowing that the patient is emotionally hurt is part of the spirituality connection. Therefore, they might need comfort. O’Brien (2001) states that, “ No other profession provides the opportunity to touch and be touched by the human spirit as does the practice of nursing. It is this intimacy that calls us to reverence: reverence for God as our creator and Lord…” (pg.110). Nurses have the privilege to connect with people in ways that no other profession may be able to provide. Since nurses are patients advocate, our duty is to connect them with their spiritual beliefs and

Like any scientific discipline, the nursing profession has evolved over time. Nurses, once regarded as housemaids and lower class citizens, now hold positions of authority and stature in our modern society. These changes in the profession are attributed to the many nurse theorists who devoted their lives to the improvement of patient care. Through their theoretical advancements, the public perception of nursing has gone from dismissive to reverential. Today, our culture considers the nursing profession to be one of the most rewarding and respected career paths an individual can pursue. Through a review of one such patient theorist, Dorothea Orem, one can witness this change in the perception of the nursing profession. As a first semester student in a professional nursing course of study, Orem has already influenced my personal nursing philosophy.

Nursing is universal in the sense that nurses can be found almost in all countries around the world (Henderson, 1978). They are in the hospitals, in school clinics, in the community centres, residential homes and even play major roles in some of the popular soap operas in television. There are even television shows that mainly revolve around nurses and which chronicles what they do at work - both the positive and the negative. It is one of the most visible and easily identifiable occupations as compared for example to other occupations such as engineers, managers or even pharmacists, medical technologists and other health related occupations. This is partly because of what nurses do and most especially how nurses look - with some still

Firstly, NICU nurses spend the most time administering direct care to their patients, and they consistently provide 24 hours a day, 7 days a week care for newborn and premature babies. Moreover, NICU nurses, in addition to providing physical care to the infants such as feeding and cleaning, help to comfort these babies and provide emotional support in the absence of their parents. NICU nurses are also able to provide continuity of care for a child that can last from the time the child is born up until he or she turns 2 years old. Furthermore, NICU nurses care for babies in the hospital’s neonatal wards that include Levels II to IV NICU wards, and which are based on the severity of an infant’s condition. Levels II and III NICU wards deal with slightly less critical to more advanced health issues while the Level IV ward is reserved for extremely critical conditions. Secondly, NICU nurses are able to perform certain, advanced procedures related to the care of their patients. Additionally, NICU nurses can attend births that are potentially life-threatening to the unborn child,

With the developments in the field of nursing, trends in theoretical writing have shifted focus to the philosophical nature of nursing. It has become almost mandatory for every practicing or student nurse to have their personal philosophy of nursing. The paper explores the philosophy of care as the root of the nursing profession and its application to the concepts of person, nursing, health, environment, nursing practice, education, administration, and research.