Nursing : The Effects Of Self-Care In Nursing

The purpose of this paper will be to explain the components of Dorothea Orem’s self-care deficit theory, the current significance of the theory, and the application of this particular nursing theory. A nursing theory is an explanation of a division of nursing that “describes, explains, predicts, or prescribes” that particular division. (Perry, Potter, Stockert, & Hall, 2013, p. 41). Orem developed her personal theory, the self-care deficit theory, to assess a patient’s ability to perform vital daily tasks and how it affected the patient’s. (Hartweg & Pickens, 2016). This theory is a grand theory, which means it can be used in almost all areas of nursing. There are five components or methods that compose this theory that nurses will practice when working with a patient who needs to reach the self-care deficit. (Edney, Jaime, & Young, 2016). It is used today and has been included in several studies that have proven it to be effective in shortening hospital visits when used on critically ill patients. (Hohdorf, 2010). This particular theory has helped advance nursing practice since Orem’s first publication.

When identifying uses and meanings of ‘self-care’, I first looked in a dictionary. The concept was defined in the Shorter Oxford dicitonary as, “Self-care (noun) taking care of one-self; self-interested behavior.” I searched the internet to get a generalized view of how the concept was being used and it was defined on Wikipedia as, “Self-care refers to actions and attitudes which contribute to the maintenance of well-being, personal health, and promotion of human developent.” I searched data bases for scholary peer reviewed articlew and retrieved limited amount of English articles on self-care. Key word searches consisted of self-care, self-care maintenance, and self-management. The definitions and uses of the concept were fairly broad. I narrowed the search to post-op patients and self-care. The two uses for the concept in the post op patient would be self-care of the post op patient and also supportive care to promote self-care of the post-op patient. The supportive care could be from a nursing system or a family member.

This assignment aims to identify self-awareness as an important attribute for nurses. I aim to achieve this by exploring why self-awareness is important and the impact it can have on nursing professionals. Finally there will be a conclusion with a thorough justification on why self-awareness is an important life skill for nurses.

The theory focuses on the ability of a person to meet his or her own needs. Developed in the year 1970, Orem’s theory focused on the three various concepts, namely self-care, self-care deficit, and the nursing system. Self-care is a group of activities or processes that a person performs to maintain health, life, and wellbeing (Orem, 2001). For instance, self-care is being demonstrated when a chronic heart failure patient checks his or her weight daily, takes prescribes medications, and avoids salty foods. Self-care deficit happens when an individual is not able to provide effective self-care (Orem, 2011). Nurses are able to assist patients in this state by educating them with their disease condition and treatment compliance. A nursing

The nursing process does not merely treat the patient as a physical body, but rather treats the patient holistically. The central philosophy of Dorothea Orem's self-care deficit nursing theory "is that all patients want to care for themselves, and they are able to recover more quickly and holistically by performing their own self-care as much as they're able" (Dorothea Orem, 2012, Nursing Theory). However, although self-care may be the core of Orem's theory, the decision to engage in self-care must be facilitated by the patient's social and physical environment, of which the family can play a critical role in shaping.

The profession of nursing requires a capacity and joy for caring and healing others both mentally and physically. Nurses spend their careers caring for patients and their families often in the worst and most frightening periods of their lives. Nursing responsibilities can be lengthy, stressful and physically and emotionally demanding. The demands of the nursing profession coupled with the nursing shortage and longer work hours put even more stress on nurses. Despite these extreme demands, many nurses do not fully appreciate the importance self-care. Yet without proper care for themselves, nurses are not able to provide the best care for their patients.

A nursing philosophy coincides with self-awareness. Nursing philosophies are developed by each individual nurse regarding the nursing practice and are important in understanding what is fundamentally important to each nurse, along with their values and beliefs. Self-awareness, in short, is knowledge of one 's self, feelings, motives, and desires. In order for nurses to develop their own nursing philosophy they must first have a good sense of self-awareness. As a future nurse it is important that I recognize my own self-awareness so I can continue to build onto my beliefs and values of the nursing profession and gain a better understanding of what is fundamentally important to me as a nurse. In this paper I will discuss why I chose the nursing profession, my beliefs and values, and what I feel is fundamentally important in the nursing profession.

Self care is essential to the nursing profession because it is a reflection on the quality of health care nurses provide to their patients, it portrays an image to the patients on what’s necessary towards healthy living and can help nurses battle with stress and personal health. Self care can be expressed as taking care of ones self’s health and overall wellbeing. This can be shown through eating healthy, exercising daily, getting enough sleep and completing weekly activities to reduce stress. Improving your overall health can benefit nurses from overworking themselves and help minimize the affects certain stressors can have on them. By doing so, the overall atmosphere in the workplace and the quality of healthcare provided to the patients will be greatly improved.

The Self-Care Deficit Theory of Nursing impacts modern health as well as nursing more so than expected during its creation and evolution. The Institute of Medicine (IOM, 2001) demanded the need for health care to shift from acute care setting to management of disease. Consequently, today’s health care is in the midst of a paradigm shift, as it redirects its attention towards patient centered care, disease prevention and wellness promotion. The Affordable Care Act implemented regulations, enforced by financial reimbursement to ensure that hospitals have shorter lengths of stay, lower readmission rates and strategies to enhance health promotion, disease prevention and improved quality of life (Taylor, 2012). The government has placed incredible demands on the health care system as baby boomers are aging and chronic diseases are becoming more complex requiring increased use of technology and nursing support. In order to meet the legislative requirements, administrators and educators must transition to the structure and concepts provided by the Self-Care Deficit Nursing Theory, for it is in this theory, nurses are empowered to better care for the patients as they present with complex self-care needs requiring specialized assistance from highly advanced, educated nurses who prepare these patients to return home better equipped for self-care despite their chronic conditions.

In essence, the role played by the nurse is to increase and facilitate the self-care abilities and level of the individual patient (Smith & Parker, 2015). As such, self-care is neither reflexive nor instinctive. Instead, it is either performed rationally or intentionally in response to an already known need. Based on this Orem's theory, rational response is learned through communication and interpersonal relations. Orem asserts that self-care agency can also be defined as the power to take action (Caruso, Cisar & Pipe, 2008). It is a complex capability developed to enable maturing adolescents and adults to recognize, identify, and understand various factors to be managed or controlled so as to decide about, develop, and perform realistic care measures. The capability discussed above is strongly dependent on culture-related values and lifelong experiences.

The model is concerned with the provision and management of self-care. A requirement for nursing exists when a person is unable to maintain for him/herself self-care action which is therapeutic in sustaining life and health, recovering from disease and injury or coping with their effects. Meet own needs through nutrition, fitness, hygiene, rest and relaxation, interpersonal relationships, meaningful work, spiritual practices, prevention and health promotion practices

Dorothea Orem’s self-care nursing philosophy encourages patient autonomy and gives patients a voice. Consequently, it increases patient responsibility and participation in their care. It provides nurses with a solid foundation to give patients’ self-sufficiency and control in caring for themselves. The self-care model is achieved when patients transform from dependent, unreceptive patients to active, engaged

Dorthea E. Orem is a well recognized and a very well educated nursing theorist. She had a lot of experience as a nurse, and this greatly helped her provide insight into her views of nursing practice, education, and science. “The question that directed Orem’s thinking was, “What condition exists in a person when judgments are made that a nurse(s) should be brought into the situation?”” (Berbiglia & Banfield, 2014) Her biggest focus was the Self- Care Deficit Nursing Theory.

Core concepts are the basis for a theory or model; concepts help in the development of theories. Theorists have developed different models or theories but have common core concepts. This paper will identify the core concept of ‘the role of nursing,’ which two theorists, Dorothea Orem and Virginia Henderson both utilized. We will compare and analyze the concept definitions among both theorists, and discuss the practical use of Orem’s self care theory.

Dorothea Orem created the self-care theory in 1959 and continued to build upon her theory until 2001. The purpose of Orem’s theory was to define nursing, discuss the relationship among the nurse and the patient, and to promote a clear understanding of the scope of nursing (Taylor, Self-Care Deficit Theory of Nursing, 2006). Today, Orem’s theory is widely known and is utilized in nursing curriculum, as well as continuing education topics for healthcare providers.