Video Reflection of the Nurses within Nurse Jackie

The nurse in Grey’s Anatomy is never treated with any respect from the doctors and surgeons. Throughout the clips she is never doing her actual job as a nurse and only relaying messages to the doctors that are seemingly unimportant in a hospital setting. This portrays the nurse as being insignificant in the

Throughout my time on the Mother Baby Care Unit, I have faced many instances in which I have been able to reflect on both my patients and the care that I was providing them. One situation in particular that I found myself critically reflecting upon involved a new mother who was feeling slightly stressed about being discharged as her newborn son would not be going home with her. For confidentiality reasons, this patient will be given the pseudonym of Kayla for the remainder of this reflection.

The case scenario portrayed Jackie, as a typical nurse who was conflicted and stressed out from both the demands of family and of the workplace environment. At home, she was pressured by her husband to take on extra overtime to supplement and augment the family’s income. Thus, in spite of feeling that her skills were not current, Jackie signed up with her previous hospital to be on the flexible staffing pool (Badzek, et al., 1998). As expected, “Jackie found the work extremely stressful. She rarely had the same unit and patient assignment” (Badzek, et al., 1998).

Nurse Jackie is curt and assertive when interacting with other members of the health care team (Hudis & Zisk, 2009). In this episode one of the patients that she provides care for dies from an acute subdural hematoma. Jackie had pushed the doctor to order a brain scan, however the doctor had insisted

“The nurse has a basic concern for people as human beings, confidence in the fundamental power of personality for good, respect for religious beliefs of others, and a philosophy which will sustain and inspire others as well as herself” (ANA, 1940; p. 980). The documentary “The American Nurse”, explores some of the biggest issues the United States faces today- aging, war, poverty, and prisons- through the lives of five very different nurses and their work as health care providers. The film examines real life people in their everyday lives as nurses which changes the way one looks at and thinks about the entire concept of nursing. Nursing is not merely a job, nor is it simply an occupation or a profession. To be a nurse, one must uphold the finest of standards and ethics, dedicating their entire lives to helping and serving others. Therefore, it cannot simply be a behavior; it is a lifestyle.

Nurses must display a knowledge of skills by portraying a functional ability to assess, treat, and prevent illness in the clinical setting. “The nurses are obliged to gain specialized knowledge, skills and training through the rigorous study of biological, physical and behavioral sciences and then use this knowledge to diagnose and treat patients suffering from different ailments. The patients treated must be under the supervision of skilled medical practitioners and the nurse must be equally directed by the expert medical practitioner. The prevention and management of illnesses, injury and ailments also forms some of the major tasks that have to be carried out by nurses. Politeness in expression, compassion for patients and proper uniform are also some of the main parts of professionalism in nursing.” (professonalism in nursing http://www.buzzle.com/articles/professionalism-in-nursing.html)

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.

The put down gossip and rumors nurse – the nurse that speaks ill about others

Within the pilot episode of Nurse Jackie, which premiered in 2009, Jackie Peyton, an emergency department RN is introduced. Nurse Jackie is an American television show set in New York city. It’s main character, Jackie, is a mother of two, married, and is addicted to prescription drugs. There are many events within this first episode, both in Jackie’s personal and work life. Jackie forges a patient’s signature on a donor card, flushes a patient’s ear down a toilet, almost kills a patient, and is having an affair with the pharmacist, who in turn is providing her with prescription drugs which she has become addicted to. Within this episode alone, Jackie goes against many nursing ethics, which does not portray nursing in a very good light.

A nurse is given an opportunity to help patients, either if its by helping them through a very serious sickness or just helping a patient get to the bathroom on time, or a time when happiness is overfilling the room and a child is being born. Registered nurses provide a wide variety of patient care services (Mitchell, p.12). A Nurse must always know where to begin and where to stop, as any other career in the health field there is always something that cannot be done by everyone but only the certified person, a nurse must always remain inside her scope of practice to prevent any misunderstandings. A nurse must also follow a code of ethics , the code of ethics of the American Association of Medical Assistants states that a nurse should at all times render service with full respect and dignity of humanity, respect confidential information obtained by a patients file, uphold the honor and high principles the profession and accept its discipline, and last but not least always want to improve her services to better serve the health and well being of the community. (Mitchell, p.65).

I believe that nursing is like a platform of servanthood. Nursing is “the diagnosis and treatment of human responses to health and illness and the protection, promotion, and optimization of health and abilities, prevention of illness and injury, facilitation of healing, alleviation of suffering through the diagnosis and treatment of human response, and advocacy in the care of individuals, families, groups, communities, and populations” (American Nurses Association, 2018). Florence Nightingale defined nursing as an “art” and “differentiated nursing from medicine” (as cited in LeMone, 2011, p. 10). Jean Watson stated that nursing is individualized and it is the “process of nursing based on the assessment of the concepts in the patient model and individualization of nursing based on logical use of the process; assessing, planning, implementing and evaluating. As much as possible, the patient should be involved in each phase of the process” (as cited in McEwen & Wills, 2011, p. 167). I am a professional. It shows by my appearance in scrubs or uniform because my image is important to the patient. My clothing should be clean and my hairstyle intact. Along with practicing hand hygiene, my fingernails should be kept low and only a wristwatch placed upon my wrist. Cohen, Bartholomew, Swihart, and Tomajan (2014) noted research study findings in which nurses identified several actions that they felt shape patient perception of them, such as whether

The media is known to have immense influences on the public perception from body images to what kind of car people should buy. And the nursing image is not immune to these influences. What Hollywood transmits to the public about nurse’s works much like an advertising industry. Television has represented nurses in varying degrees and not all of them are flattering. We have been portrayed as

Language and behavior. In any profession, there is specific language that goes along with it. A nurse’s terminology is made up of mostly medical terms that are a person’s anatomy and physiological make up, medications, diseases, procedures etc. To be an effective communicator in this profession being up to date on medical terminology is a must. This is called the standardized language of medicine. “When everyone understands what a condition, medicine, or procedure is, they are able to fulfill their roles accordingly, whether that is delivering medicine or billing for a medicine” (PCC Institute of Health Professionals, 2017). Along with language expectations, there are ways a nurse is expected to carry themselves. Patients expect their nurses to be compassionate, keep them informed, and have good bedside manner. This means

The objective of this reflection is to explore and reflect upon a situation from a clinical placement on an orthopedic unit. The incident showed that I did not provide safe, timely and competent care for my patient when the oxygen saturation was low. Furthermore, this reflection will include a description of the incident, and I will conclude with explaining what I have learned from the experience and how it will change my future actions.

This course really developed my self as a nurse, and it will help me in giving care to actual clients in the real world as well. First of all, this course taught us all about Florence Nightingale, who is viewed as one of the first nursing theorists. Her becoming a nurse, her practices as a nurse, her theory, her tenets, and most importantly, her being one of the most influential figures, even as of this very day. In this course, through essay writing we understood more about how Florence Nightingale’s theory and practices are still relevant today. We were able to connect her tenets to the real world programs. This can really help us in giving care because we learnt about how her practices are applied and so we are also able to apply her practices while providing clients care. Not only that, but we learned about how committed Nightingale was to provide the utmost care for the client and how the client is very important, with knowing this, we can also provide the greatest care that the client deserves. She strived for professional nursing and had laid the foundation, and we need to follow in these footsteps as well. Her achievements can aid in motivating us to become better and improve ourselves as a nurse everyday, as she did emphasize the importance of restoring one’s health.