Ways For Nurses For A Family With Chronic Illness

As a graduate of the Doctor of Nursing Practice in a Family Nurse Practitioner specialty, I aim to challenge myself further in the field of nursing by providing efficient and effective care to individuals of all ages. In the role of Family Nurse Practitioner, I will be able to care for infants, adults, and elderly patients, and help them to manage acute and chronic illnesses. I will also focus on improving quality of life by offering preventative care options to patients. Furthermore, I would be able to provide more in depth care and establish rapport with patients and families to help them care for their own personal health through assessment, diagnosis, and treatment. Currently, as a Registered Nurse on a Cardiology Intermediate Care Unit,

Many people have many different definitions of a family. Some include family as the people they live with, some include their entire extended family, and some include friends, neighbors, coaches, and teachers. According to the Vanier Institute (2013), a family is “a combination of two or more persons who are bound together over time by ties of mutual consent, birth, and/or adoption” (para. 2). Whichever way you look at it, families often play a major role in life. It only makes sense that when a person begins to go through a drastic change in life such as illness, the family will be involved. This is why it is important that nurses learn how to provide suitable client and family centered care. They can do this by following the four

Although the largest profession in the health care industry is nursing, a larger number of people are getting older and living longer. This means that more people will need nursing care, whether it’s in a hospital, a long-term care facility or at home. It is projected that long-term care facilities will need 66% more RNs by 2020 (Addressing the Nursing). The increase in life expectancy has amplified the complexity of health care because more people are living with chronic conditions. The American Nurses Association reported that “a large cross-sectional study of over 1,000,000 adults revealed that 82% had one or more chronic conditions” and we are seeing an increase of those age 65 and older living with multiple chronic conditions (Mion). Now, more than ever, there is a high demand for the best delivery of medical care.

Although I enjoy all facets of nursing, I truly believe that it is in the field of family practice that the foundation of the nursing process begins. I have seen many patients over the course of my career without a stable, primary care healthcare provider. Health and wellness begins with day-to-day habits, and a nurse in family care is uniquely poised to give wellness advice and guidance. Family nurse practitioners often perform similar functions to physicians: making diagnoses; prescribing tests and medications; and helping patients over the course of their life trajectories lead more fulfilling lives. Primary caregiving is truly wellness promotion. It involves not simply healing the sick, but also reducing the likelihood that patients will become ill. I have seen so many patients with preventable illnesses that could have

work with individual families and with families as an aggregate within the population (Clark, 2003). Several areas will be presented such as biophysical, psychological, physical environmental, sociocultural, behavioral and health system considerations. The data obtained during family health assessment enable the nurse to make informed decisions about the health care needs of families (Clark).

All health care providers are familiar or have some idea of what family focused care entails. Family focused care can be practiced in any settings in healthcare, and nurses are familiar with this concept as this strong theory based teaching is emphasized throughout the nursing curriculum. With the trend of health care delivery shifting towards home based or community setting, it is now more than ever important for nurses and advance practice nurses (APN) to incorporate family nursing practice for improved outcomes for the patient and their families. This paper will discuss one of the many family nursing theory and its impact on the family nursing practice now and in the future.

The role of nurse practitioner is valuable when discussing collaborative care. There are so many levels of care, so many health entities, and so many insurer criteria involved that it is instrumental to have a role that can work towards help bring all aspects together. In addition to diagnosing, treating, and managing care, the role of the nurse practitioner is to manage simple and episodic acute health issues along with chronic disease (Sangster-Gormley, Martin-Misener, & Burge, 2013). It is important to note that although this is a function of this role, nurse practitioners also practice from a holistic point of view which allows them to help manage patient conditions or wellness in a more complete fashion. This includes helping patients have access to care beyond primary and secondary care settings. This encourages nurse practitioners to work alongside other health care and allied health professions, and families to create an individualized plan for every patient (van

Family nursing is not all about patient centered care, it is focused on the needs of the family as a whole (Nursing theory). The main goal for family nursing is to improve any health concerns by assessing the needs,problems,influences, and strentghs of the family (Journal of nursing). There are four four types of approaches to family nursing. The four types of approaches to family nursing are, family as context, family as client, family as system, and family as component of society (the book). The purpose of this paper is to define, discuss, and give examples of the four types of approaches to family nursing.

Think back to when you were a child and you became ill. All you wanted was the protection and guidance of your mother to take care of you. If you had older siblings, maybe they were the ones that helped make you feel better. Even as we grow older, we rely on our family for support when we are not well. When a family member is ill, it is not just that one person that suffers. When an illness strikes a family member, it oftentimes includes the whole family to deal with the illness also. There are different approaches that a nurse can utilize when dealing with family nursing. Approaches include family as context, as a client, system and a component of society. In this paper, I will discuss where and how these approaches are utilized.

The purpose of this paper is to incorporate one family's experience of living with multiple chronic illnesses into the Calgary Family Assessment Model (CFAM) and Rolland's Chronic Health Challenge Framework. CFAM was developed by Dr. Lorraine M. Wright, a professor Emeritus of nursing and by Dr. Maureen Leahey, a manager of a mental health outpatient program both have over 25 years experience while still managing to supervise, teach, consult, write, and maintain a part-time clinical practice in individual, couple, and family therapy (Moxie, 2007). CFAM allows nurses to assess families during interviews. CFAM is a multidimensional framework consisting of three major categories: structural, dimensional and functional. (Wright & Leahey, 2005)

Frequently, I encounter patients with poor management of chronic illness that I can attribute to the lack of primary care, guidance, and can sense an overwhelming need from the community for more skilled, compassionate, and competent Family Nurse Practitioners.

“Family-centered care” is a term heard often in healthcare settings and in nursing practice. Family-centered care has been recognized as being an integral part to patient health, satisfaction and health care quality (Kuo, et al, 2012). Family-centered care is implemented with the goal to increase partnerships between, families, patients and providers; and has been prioritized as a core-concept of quality healthcare (Gallo, Hill, Hoagwood & Olin, 2016) Many professionals, however, would be hard-pressed to state what the term “family-centered care” actually means and how it applies to nursing practice. They would be at a loss for how to implement family-centered care and what is absolutely necessary to have in order for family-centered care to be successful. Advanced practice nurses are faced with the challenge of adhering to family-centered care in their practice. Illness, both chronic and acute, and health does not just affect the patient involved in care. Illness and health affect the patient, their children, their spouses, their parents, their brothers, their sisters, their grandparents and anyone else involved in their life. Research by Davidson (2009) supports the idea that the perceived effectiveness of communication between healthcare providers and the patient’s family is related to the overall satisfaction of care. Advance

Often in practice, we as nurses deal with a variety of diseases and treatments and often have to react to the illness that the patient presents with upon our interaction. While this is an essential piece of our practice, we also have a duty to our patients to be proactive in preventing specific health-related consequences based on their risk factors and to promote their health and well being. Health promotion as it relates to nursing is about us empowering our patients to increase their control over their lives and well beings and includes: focusing on their health not just illness, empowering our patients, recognizing that health involves many dimensions and is also effected by factors outside of their control (Whitehead et al. 2008)..

Family is playing an important part in helping to ensure that patients are fit and following the advice of health care professionals. This is because the family is a foundation of support for everyone. At the same time, members can learn about what is impacting their loved one and what kind of procedures need to be followed. When this happens, there will be higher amounts of compliance as they will ensure that the patient continues to stick with their treatment protocol. (Saleeba, 2009)

A nursing diagnosis identifies an actual or potential response of a patient to a health problem (Jones 2009). Nursing diagnoses are important because they provide the foundation for the selection of nursing interventions (Walton 2008). This care plan is the concluding half to the initial care plan that identified nursing diagnoses and goals with the aim of promoting the holistic wellbeing, mental health, and independence of a 68 year old Mr. Bertoli who has returned home from hospital after experiencing a stroke. Particular emphasis will be placed on proposed interventions to achieve Mr. Bertoli’s healthcare goals and the provision of rationales. This is important to justify the significance of the interventions and indicate