Introduction Kolcaba explained three different views of comfort. First meaning, “as the state of having discomfort relieved”, secondly as the “state of ease and peaceful contentment”, third “as relief from discomfort” (Kolcaba, & Kolcaba, 1991). [not a complete sent!] A goal of nursing practice, as contained in statements of standards for care, has been generally to help the patient be comfortable or be in a state of comfort (Kolcaba, & Kolcaba, 1991). Patients require comfort care pre-, intra-, and post-operatively. For the surgical patient, comfort care is initiated from admission until discharge. I’m faced daily with patients who come in for surgery and my goal for them is to make sure they are comfortable right from when they walk in through the door until they are discharged home, or admitted to the hospital as the case may be. Being familiar with the concept of comfort and its outcome on patient satisfaction, helps me to incorporate it into my daily plan of care. [review the guidelines of the paper for what should be included in the Introduction]
Aims
The aim of this paper is to provide a concept analysis of comfort care with the goal of better understanding of its key attributes in order to clarify its use in nursing practice, theory and research. comfort care in the context of physical (pain and nausea), psycho spiritual (anxiety), environmental (noise from staff) and sociocultural (lack of culturally sensitive care) is its application through pain relief,
The concepts of the comfort theory are clearly defined and the relationships are easily understood. This theory is simple and basic to nursing care. The taxonomic structure of comfort facilitates researchers’ development of comfort instruments for new settings (Kolcaba,1991).The first assertion of the theory stating that effective comfort interventions leads to increased comfort for patients , has been tested and supported with women with breast cancer (Kolcaba & Fox, 1999), persons with UI (Dowd, Kolcaba, & Steiner, 2000), persons in hospice (Kolcaba, Dowd, Steiner, & Mitzel, 2004). And stressed college students (Dowd, Kolcaba, Steiner, & Fashinapaur, 2007). Also, the second assertion was supported in the UI study, when patients with enhanced comfort showed increased HSBs.
Conceptual analysis is integral in understanding nursing theory. According to Walker and Avant (1995), concept analysis allows nursing scholars to examine the attributes or characteristics of a concept. It can be used to evaluate a nursing theory and allows for examination of concepts for relevance and fit within the theory. The phenomena of pain will be discussed in this paper and how it relates to the comfort theory.
Florence Nightingale’s nursing theory is probably the most well known in the nursing profession. “Patients are to be put in the best condition for Nature to act on them. It is the responsibility of nurses to reduce noise, to relieve patients’ anxiety, and to help them sleep” (Theories of Florence Nightingale, 2012). This theory emphasizes that environmental factors and adaptation is the basis of holistic nursing care. This theory is important in my opinion because it ensures that the center of focus is on the patient. When patients are hospitalized making them comfortable in a new and strange environment is important to me. Eliminating noise at the nursing station and turning down the lighting in the hallways at night are just a few ways that nurses can improve the environmental factors surrounding patients. During hospitalizations I strive to eliminate any anxiety that my patient may be experiencing. Upcoming procedures and treatments can cause tremendous stress. Simply by providing sufficient information regarding treatments or procedures can be beneficial in reducing anxiety or
In their analysis they provide great detail on how restorative care makes a difference to provide adequate care to e residents. The goal is to have the residents highest level of physical performance achieved. Also to improve the residents’ quality of life, self-image, and self-esteem. Sometimes restorative care nursing can run into barriers. Residents may have pain and depression, and age related conditions. Their biggest barrier is recognizing direct refusal of residents. With constant training, nursing assistants’ capability to provide restorative care should
The comfort theory is a nursing theory that was first developed in the 1990s by Katharine Kolcaba. The Theory of Comfort considers patients to be individuals, families, institutions, or communities in need of health care (Petiprin, 2015). The environment in which this theory can be applied is in any aspect of the patient, family, or institutional surroundings that can be controlled by a nurse or a patient’s loved one by means to enhance their comfort. Health is considered to be optimal functioning in the patient, as defined by the patient, group, family, or community (Kolcaba, 2005).
It is my personal belief that environment plays a considerable role in the patient’s short term and long-term wellbeing. When nurses acknowledge the environment that the patient is interacting in while receiving their care we know this greatly impacts the overall successfulness of the care plan. The patient’s feelings must be
In my nursing practice, I frequently care for dying patients. Instead of simply providing medication to ease pain during the dying process, I wanted to learn about ways to enhance the comfort of the dying patients and possibly assist their family during a difficult time. This desire led me to examine the conceptual model of comfort. Through my research of the concept of comfort care at end of life, I discovered Katherine Kolcaba’s theory of comfort. I found her theory to be useful in describing the concept of comfort care and decided to further analyze it for a more thorough understanding of its usefulness and applicability to nursing practice. Nurses are the ones in direct contact with their patients, providing relief from certain discomforts, continuously assessing, monitoring and providing care that will ensure the patient is at ease. According to Kolcaba, “Comfort is the desirable state that nurses would want for their patients.” (Kolcaba, 2003). With its fundamental emphasis on physical, psychospiritual, sociocultural, and environmental aspects of comfort, the Theory of Comfort care will contribute to a proactive and multifaceted approach to care. This paper aims to describe the origin of Comfort Theory, its primary concepts and relational statements, review of the literature, critique describing its strength and limitation as a middle range theory
The interventions will be aimed at reducing as far as possible all factors that decrease the threshold and promote those that increase it. It is of no use to judge the pain of others. Nursing care should recognize the presence of the painful experience of the patient, listen carefully and evaluate the factors that condition. Assess the response to analgesics as important as identifying the intensity of pain at the start of the intervention, it is reassessing its evolution time and under the treatment plan is implemented. In hospitalized patients should ask about pain at frequent intervals, every four hours or at least once per shift, and always after administration extra to check their adequacy and effectiveness dose. What drug it was effective and what dose is information that should not be left to memory for later transmission. Its systematic registration history is essential for inter-coordination. Moreover, the patient transmits real interest on the part of professionals and reinforces the therapeutic relationship and
This essay will aim to look at the main principles of cancer pain management on an acute medical ward in a hospital setting. My rational for choosing to look at this is to expend my knowledge of the chosen area. Within this pieces of work I will look to include physiological, psychological and sociological aspects of pain management.
In the physical realm of patient-centered care pain, comfort, sleep, and rest are important aspects of the fourth dimension of patient-centered care. Patient-centered care is the complete focus of the medical team on providing respectful care to meet patient needs, preferences and values guide decisions on each individual patient care. To understand the subjective view of the patient, these four aspects are at the forefront of their needs within the hospital setting to provide the best patient outcome. Nurses provide good patient-centered care by actively partnering with patients to determine care priorities and plans to tailor their level of involvement, according to their preferences, and being flexible by changing the care plan as the situation changes including providing smooth transitions between care goals. By doing this, nurses can assist patients with all pain by providing comfort and assuring the patient that there will be no deficiency of their quality of sleep.
The concept of comfort is one that nurses provide every shift; however, it is not always easy to define. Katherine Kolcaba’s Comfort Theory will be used. Walker and Avant’s method for concept analysis will be used. The first step is to select a concept, which is comfort. The next step is determining the purpose of the analysis. The purpose is to define what comfort means and what comfort measures are and how they are used in nursing. The third step is to identify the uses of the concept of comfort. This includes definitions of term comfort and a literature search. The fourth step is to determine the defining attributes of comfort. This allows for insight into the
A surgical nurse is responsible for monitoring and ensuring quality healthcare for a patient following surgery. Assessment, diagnosis, planning, intervention, and outcome evaluation are inherent in the post operative nurse’s role with the aim of a successful recovery for the patient. The appropriate provision of care is integral for prevention of complications that can arise from the anaesthesia or the surgical procedure. Whilst complications are common at least half of all complications are preventable (Haynes et al., 2009). The foundations of Mrs Hilton’s nursing plan are to ensure that any post surgery complications are circumvented. My role as Mrs Hilton’s surgical nurse will involve coupling my knowledge and the professional
Comfort is defined by Merriam-Webster’s dictionary (2014) as “a state or situation in which you are relaxed and do not have any physically unpleasant feelings caused by pain, heat, cold, etc.” or as “a state or feeling of being less worried, upset, frightened, etc., during a time of trouble or emotional pain.” Dictionary.com (2014) defines comfort as “a feeling of relief or consolationm” or “a person or thing that gives consolation,”or “ a state of ease and satisfaction of bodily wants, with freedom from pain and anxiety.” Dictionary.com (2014) lists the origin of the word comfort as coming from the 13th century Old French term confort, meaning “source of alleviation or relief.” One can see there are multiple meanings and interpretations of the word comfort. This paper will set forth to discuss the word comfort as a concept and its interpretation and use in many disciplines, including its significance in nursing.
The developmental stages of the mid range theory of comfort are discussed in this article, which includes its philosophic orientation and its inductive, deductive, and retroductive reasoning. Other steps that are described are the concept analysis of comfort, the operationalization of the outcome of patient comfort, the application of the theory in previous nursing studies, and the evaluation of the current theory as it has been adapted for outcomes research. This article is a guide that shows how a concept grows, becomes embedded in theory, is tested, and is adapted for the rapidly changing health care environment. The theory of comfort
Mrs. Mavis is a Palliative patient who is receiving comfort measures in her nursing care. It is important to evaluate the effectiveness of her pain