Nursing Assessment Paper

I think that every aspects of nursing assessment are challenging and it depends on the nurses’ experience. When we have a new admit patient/resident, nursing admission assessment should be completed within 24 hours, and I usually would finish it. Working on the night shift, I find it challenging to complete the assessment because the patient is already tired and wanting to have sleep. I cannot force them to participate, and it is the resident’s right to refuse. When assessing for the Brief Interview of Mini-mental Status (BIMS), it is often not 100% correct due to contributing factors involved, that is being sleepy and tired. When BIMS is done during the day, the result is way different than what I had obtained. To have a new patient in the rehabilitation floor who have frustrations in life might be more challenging because the patient might not participate in the assessment, in his care or just give up. On the other hand, if we have a new admit for the dementia or Alzheimer’s unit, job-related stress element is the least challenging because the patient is there for long term stay. However, this should not be over-looked and the previous job of the patient needs to be
assessed in order for us to have a background. There are times that the patient has lucid moments and has behavior issues that relate to their previous job, and as nurses, we could develop interventions to minimize or to de-escalate the situation, if possible without needing PRN medications.
The holistic health is dealing with the entirety of the patient’s health, including but not limited to the assessment of the patient’s background, cultures and values, health practices, and family and social roles (Jarvis, 2016).
These elements are valuable in determining the patient’s health because it reflects how a person views health as a whole and what he/she would do to maintain it. Jarvis (2016) stated that “each person is responsible for his or her own personal health stated and is an active participant in health care” (p. 7). That being said, I often encourage my residents to perform as much ADLs they could do to promote independence. Although my residents have dementia, Alzheimer’s disease, and have decreased mobility, encouraging them to be an active participant in their care is
important.
The biggest hurdle would be language barrier because I may not be able to gather the right information if I could not communicate with my patient. Language communication is an important tool with our patient assessment. I remembered one of my patient in the rehabilitation floor who did not speak English. She spoke Italian, and it was tough taking care of her trying to figure out what she needed. We did not have a 24-hour interpreter in place for her. We utilized pictograph in communicating with her. I downloaded an Italian translator on my phone so that I could communicate with her in her language. The patient was appreciative of that.
Overall, to avoid prejudices and biases when assessing the patient, the nurse or shall I say, I should be aware of my own background to understand my patients. It takes years of experience to master the art of patient assessment, and I know I still need to learn and hone my skills in order to be a better nurse.