Communication in Nursing

With all do respect but saying that I don’t have to know how to write academically as a health professional is a false statement that I strongly disagree with. The opposition has tried to tell that academic writing will cause person centered-care to deteriorate which entirely wrong because registered nurses are capable of accomplishing different tasks in a short period of time. We are trained to be flexible and reliable at all times. Nursing documentation provides a means of communication between members of the health team involved in the continuity and documentation of care. As we all know nursing documentations helps to evaluate whether patients are meeting their outcomes or how they are responding to treatments. The more skilled the writing of the nurse, the more accurate, complete and viable her documentation will be perceived and therefore valued.

Accurate record keeping and careful documentation is an essential part of nursing practice. The Nursing and Midwifery Council states that ‘good record documentation helps to protect the welfare of patients and clients’ – which of course is a fundamental aim for nurses everywhere.

Registered nurses have a legal and professional duty of care. According to Nursing and Midwifery Council Guidelines, your record keeping and documentation should demonstrate:

-a full description of your assessment and the care planned and given

- relevant information about your patient or client at any given time and what you did in response to their needs.

-that you have understood and fulfilled your duty of care, that you have taken all reasonable steps to care for the patient or client and that any of your actions or things you failed to do have not compromised their safety in any way.

- a record of any arrangement that you have made for the continuing care of the patient or client.

I don’t think that us registered nurses can effectively document all this if we don’t possess the skill of academic writing.