Reflection Affects Nursing Practice In The Clinical Setting

How Reflection Affects Nursing Practice in the Clinical Setting
Dakota Melland
The Christ College of Nursing and Health Sciences

Abstract The purpose of this paper is to explain how the skill of reflection affects nursing students in the clinical setting. Different reflection examples and how they affect nursing practice will be discussed. A nursing reflective study from 2007 will also be explained to give a better understanding of how reflection enhances nursing student’s educations during clinical decision making. Introduction Reflection is defined as “active, purposeful thought applied to an experience to understand the meaning of that experience for the individual” (Ashby, 2006, paragraph 3). In simpler terms reflection can be defined
as a form of studying to guide students in a direction to make better clinical decisions. It also acts as an aid during the critical thinking process. This skill has been proven to provide assistance for students, when placed in dire situations, to make the most appropriate decision in a timely manner. Reflection of past situations allows time for thought and understanding to those who have to make vital decisions on a daily basis.
Models for Reflective Practice There are many different methods of reflecting.
One of the most common is modeling. This allows the individual to look at and understand the situation from many different views as opposed to seeing it from one person’s view. This helps to understand why people react the way they do in each situation. For example, if a patient goes into cardiac arrest and the patient’s nurse runs into his or her room to start chest compressions, a different nurse grabs the crash cart, and a third nurse sprints down the hallway to get a rolling computer. Upon reflection through modeling each nurse, in this situation, will get the chance to more fully understand why the other two nurses did what they did during the critical situation. The third nurse will now have the chance to understand that maybe he or she should’ve gone into the patient’s room to attempt to help the first nurse instead of running to get the computer. The other two nurses would get to understand that the third nurse went to get the computer to be sure everything was documented correctly, but in reality this was not the best decision in this
situation.
Question Asking Asking self-questions is a specific form of modeling that helps in the clinical setting reflection as well. After the event is said and done each nurse is able to ask him or herself questions such as “why did I do that?” or “what was the most important action to take at that time?” Asking oneself these questions make it possible to make better or different decisions in the future when similar incidents may occur.
2007 Study In 2007 a study was done on the relationship between classroom education and clinical decision-making using the reflective technique. The study took place in Norway on third year nursing students who used reflection as a form of study for their clinical rotations. The students were given a questionnaire to answer according to how well they use a reflective technique during clinical. After the study was finished, the results showed that those who used a reflective technique to make clinical decisions more often than not were more successful in the nursing field compared to those who didn’t use it as much. The findings indicated that students who use reflection are better able to tie education to clinical decision-making.
When students retain knowledge from the classroom and use it during clinical they are able to reflect on each situation with a better understanding of why everyone did what they did. Medical terms can act as barriers to anyone new in the medical field. Students must also use reflection in the classroom. When reflection is used in the classroom a better medical terminology understanding is learned and remembered. This helps in the clinical decision making process as well. If the students are able to retain the knowledge they learned in the classroom, they can relate to situations in clinical more, which makes it easier to make decisions based on current
situations.
Conclusion
After reading about reflection and the clinical decision making process. I have come to the conclusion that using reflection to make decisions in everyday nursing practice leads to a more positive outcome in the long run. Therefore I have decided that reflection is a beneficial form of studying when it comes to rapid critical thinking during clinical rotations.