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Personal Essay, 7 pages (1900 words)

Assessment of personal character and beliefs in nursing

(A) Value is a general notion that describes the beliefs of a person or culture. A set of worth may be placed into a general understanding of a value system. Values are regarded subjective and vary across people and culture.

All individuals have dispositions, beliefs and values but the registered nursing codes of ethics require professionals to focus on the needs of their patients and to guarantee that their own value judgments do not hinder care provision and delivery. This holistic view, which includes the quality of a nurse, links with virtue ethics. Virtue ethics suggests that morally capable or virtuous people are those who have incorporate values that promote general human growth.

Values and beliefs are very important to the human spirit. Values and beliefs affect all areas of our lives and play an important role in health and coping with illness. Values and beliefs affect how we live and how we die. Values influence the choice we make throughout life, if they are wrong or right. Ones personal value system is developed at early childhood. Most researchers believe that most of our values are well developed by the time we reach 10years of age. Values are based on the beliefs that are inculcated by our family, culture, church, media and peer groups while we were growing up.

Because we develop our values based on a special combination of time, place and experiences no two same persons have the same beliefs and values. People of the same age, cultural backgrounds are likely to share same belief and values. Every one of us find it very difficult to understand people whose values are different from ours. Each person thinks that his or her own beliefs and values are somehow better to other people’s own. As a nurse I should identify the special spiritual needs of my patient based on their religion because different religious beliefs and practices can vary widely

As a registered nurse this requires critical assessment of personal character and beliefs. If these qualities or competence are raised throughout my life and within my preparation for practice, then my habits and character traits that I possess should help my patient centered way to care.

(B)Using the Burford NDU model for structured reflection I will like to reflect back to the case where a 16 year old girl walked up to me in the hospital where I worked in Nigeria as a registered nurse asking me if there was any way I could help her after she was told by the doctor on duty that she needed her parents to be with her and give an informed consent before such procedure can be carried out. When she came to me I noticed she was so down and bitter but what really stroked me was her walking up to me if there was any way I could help her.

(C)In reflecting back this prompted me to ask this question, how she was feeling about her situation? It allowed me to assess how emotionally down she was feeling about her because as a nurse we are to put our patients feelings first. Through simple action such as giving her a listening ear I could see she was confused could hear her voice was flat and she was really frightened. The next cue question came up my mind which was how can I best help this young girl? After sharing my uncertainty about not knowing how best to help her, I also noticed she was anxious so I calmed her down by telling her about the ethics of the profession and that my values and beliefs cannot make me do otherwise.

(D)Nursing field had always been my childhood dream, I find the human body very fascinating as such, I wanted to be a nurse. In Nigeria where I grew up, I saw many sick and hurting people whenever I follow my mother to the hospital for my check up or hers. This sick people were always in pains, crying all the time and it always saddens my heart to see people in pain, but I could not help them. I am a very compassionate and caring person. As a nurse I want to help people achieve and maintain good health, make them feel better and special, let them know that someone cares about how they feel and helping them get well whatever the situation.

I choose nursing because I wanted a career where I will feel fulfilled and earn a decent living. The flexibility and freedom with the profession is awesome. The greatest accomplishment I always have with this noble profession is the feeling of knowing I always make a difference in people’s life. I believe nurses should be more caring and treat everybody under their care equally because the code of conduct states that no special treatment should be given to anyone, everybody should be treated equally. As a professional in the field of nursing, my character should be of good conduct, behavior and attitude. I possess a good character which makes me capable and safe for effective practice in the society without any supervision. As a young girl growing up, my mother has always sang it into my head that secrets should be kept secret. Growing up with this mind set made confidentiality a sounding part of the code that I value. Respecting people’s right to confidentiality and not disclosing patients’ information to anyone who does not have a right to it. Collaborating with patients in my care makes the work more interesting for me and my patient. It brings this harmony and understanding in the care process. Accountability is my watch word because as a nurse I have to act in the best interest of the people I am caring for. Taking responsibility for my actions and being transparent and open.

Knowing what my values are as a nurse is the starting point for a life-long relationship. It can also be gradually develop over time, a gap between what i value and how i act in line to what I say I value. Acting in a way that stresses the gap between the two can lead me into stress. Lack one being yourself often comes from a lack of awareness in the values or beliefs at the core of who I am.

Futhermore when we do not believe in who we are and what we believe and value, difficulties and changes are often a threat.

A good nurse gives meaning to others through strengthening shared values that are not in line with the group shared values for practice. When values are not in focus strength can become easily gone, making it difficult to motivate deep real values, provided an avenue for continuous growth that takes us towards our vision. Knowing what my values and belief are is only the beginning of processes for a great change. Placing values and beliefs into practice entales overcoming a number of obstacles which exist in me and my workplace.

(E)Multicultural awareness involves a personal knowledge of cultural diversity; such knowledge gives a sure and better approach to communication and interactions between groups of people in a multicultural setting. It allows a third alternative to judgments of good or bad between two culturally different persons or groups in conflict, because it explains behavior in the context of the various culture involved. Culture is not an obscure or exotic label attached to people and places.

Culture controls health care decisions , practices and propel the way we react to illness and pain. For example in cultures where they do not eat raw foods, the rate of shigellosis may not be as high as that of culture where they consume raw meat and fish. Cultural taboos against consuming proteinous food during pregnancy has a destructive and bad effect on the growing fetous. Cultural values shapes human responses to illness and put the person in a situation if the individual will look for professional care when ill and abide to prescribed treatment.

Beliefs and values affects the way about various aspects of health. Patients always tend to define wellness and illness in the believe of their own culture ( 1991). Belief and cultural sensitivity is very vital when caring for patient . Nurses must be able to give culturally necessary care to diverse population of clients. Cultural differences present special challenges for nurses who must give care that does not tally with personal beliefs and values. Nurses caring for patients who are different from them must remember to find out how the patient views the illness, including the importance that the patient assigns to the illness. The nurse must respect individual differences. For example a Jehovah’s Witness that refuses blood transfusion while on admission should be respected with his or her belief

(F)Most conflicts start within the structure and function of an organization due to the management and policy style, procedures that causes them. These are called organizational conflict. In this type of conflict, the leader’s behavior and role is very important to both the root of the conflict and to the solving of the issue. In complex situations that require the management of care, there are sometimes when a leader has to deal with not planned crises and will need to settle conflicts between staff and in interactions with clients and their families.

A good leader is the one who only can deal with events in such manner that causes less of disruption, but is able to stop situations from happening in the first place. Taking example from the NMC essential ability clusters, registered nurses are expected to respond very well to feedback from clients, the public and a big range of sources as a channel for learning and development. It goes on to say that this involves nurses responding very well and gives a feedback by way of writing down of complaints and seeking for opportunities to share with others so that they learn from future practice. Good leaders of care not only should have skill in dealing with situations of conflict, but also be able to plan ahead so that such situation does not come up again in the future. Parsley and Corrigan (1999) identified that ensuring a zero-defect the goal should be to totally eliminate all mistakes that happened so that no complaints will be necessary.

Although the handling of problem is one of a leader of care occupying the role of disturbance handler, there are some few elements to how one can practice their management skills that could be common to many other cases involving unplanned crisis . This may involve a method to ones practice which is supported by honesty and ethical principles(Beauchamp &Childress 2001) and guided by external reality and established procedure. In a case scenario where the nurses I worked with always wanted to force their beliefs on patients I managed myself and became a leader of my own personal practice by protecting my patient’s right and belief.

(G)As a result of learning and writing assignments on the unit course, I have learn a lot of positive behaviors that will help and guide my in future and all through my nursing practice carrier . Reading the Nursing and Midwifery code of conduct and making a note out of it has really helped me to remember all the codes I forgot. I would look back and self assess myself and my behavior and say I have provided care to a satisfactory standard by abiding to all the rules of the code.

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