Holistic Care for Adult and Child Nursing - Essay Example

? Holistic Care in Relation to Adult Nursing and Child Nursing Total Number of Words 527 Introduction Caring for the sick individuals is not limited to the administering of medications, managing the signs and symptom of a disease, and/or the providing assistance to patients each time they perform their activities of daily living (ADL). In general, nurses should care for their patients including the patients’ family members (Stannard and Krenzischek, 2012, p. 160). Therefore, when providing holistic care to the patients, it is essential for nurses to know that their healthcare services should be delivered not only to the patient but also the patient’s family members. This study will focus on discussing the significance of holistic care in relation to adult nursing and child nursing. As part of discussing the significance of holistic care in adult and child nursing, some real-life clinical examples will be provided when practicing spirituality in holistic care for adult and child patients. Eventually, several reasons will be provided as to why nurses should exert an effort to incorporate spirituality when giving holistic care to the patients. Significance of Holistic Care in Relation to Adult Nursing and Child Nursing Holistic care is all about being able to deliver caring service that will uplift not only the physical health of the patients but also their mental, social, psychological, emotional, and spiritual well-being (Broker and Nicol, 2003, p. 4). There are quite a lot of similarities and differences with regards to the provision of holistic care to adult and child patients. Similar to child nursing, the adult nursing aims to promote a healthy lifestyle and prevent diseases. Before planning, delivering, and evaluating the quality of healthcare services given to each patient, holistic care in adult nursing and child nursing aims to identify the specific healthcare needs of the patients (Broker and Nicol, 2003, p. 4). For this reason, holistic care is important in both the adult and child care nursing. However, adult and child patients require different approach in healthcare. This explains why the application of holistic care in child nursing different from that of an adult nursing. For example, as compared to the level of stress that the family members are experiencing when taking care of an adult patient who has insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus, the family members are more stressed out when caring for children who are suffering from chronic disease (Hobson and Noyes, 2011). Since the parents of the child has other important obligation to do during day time, it is expected that the child’s parents will be experiencing excessive stress when taking care of a sick child. Therefore, healthcare professional should incorporate the practice of spirituality when providing holistic care to a child patient. Healthcare professionals should consider all possible interventions that can effectively improve such resilience. For instance, when dealing with young patients, healthcare professionals should develop a balanced coping strategy that will allow the parents of a sick child to maintain a good physical and mental health and meet the medical and emotional needs of the child (Major, 2003). By doing so, the nurses will be able to make the family members easily cope with the child’s chronic illness. Examining how the patient’s family function will also make it easier on the part of the nurse(s) to gain better idea on how they can effectively manage or lessen the physical and emotional stress that the parents and the child’s siblings may be experiencing in times of dealing with the patient’s chronic disease. Upon developing a list of effective nursing intervention, healthcare professionals could more or less be able to lessen and minimize the chances wherein the family members would experience negative emotions such as anger and depression. Another good way of providing spirituality in holistic care is for the healthcare professionals to be able to identify the risk factors that may trigger psychosocial problems among the patient’s family members. For instance, chronic disease can make a patient develop poor communication and social isolation from his/her family members and friends. To avoid having to experience such case, Yarbo, Wujcik and Gobel (2011, p. 1789) explained that nurses should fascilitate two-way communication among the family members and the healthcare professionals. By educating the family members about the patient’s chronic diesease, the patient can be better understood by his/her family members. Aside from establishing a close nurse-patient relationship (Wright, 2002), open communication is also necessary in encouraging the patients to receive supportive counseling with regards to their emotional pain and psychological disturbances (Dunne, Sullivan and Kernohan, 2005; (Jarrett, Payne and Wiles, 1999). Unlike the older people, the young adolescents who are experiencing chronic illnesses may have a difficult time accepting their sickness before finally accepting treatment and care from the physicians and other related healthcare professionals. In line with this, Smart, Aslander-van Vliet and Waldron (2009) found out that young adolescents who have diabetes mellitus are less concern about their weight and the type of food and drink they consume. Even though these young individuals are able to manage to find time for their insulin injection and monitoring of blood sugar, the careless attitude of young people when it comes to eating prohibited foods and drink simply reflect that inacceptance of the young people with regards to having a chronic illness. Therefore, nurse intervention is necessary among the young patients. Regardless of age, gender, race or nationality, caring for terminally ill patients require a different type of holistic care from the nurses (Patricia, Enes and de Vries, 2004). To effectively apply spirituality in the provision of holistic care for terminally ill patients, it is possible on the part of the healthcare professionals to practice symbolic activities such as praying, lighting candles, burning of incense, making the sign of the cross, and/or using the prayer beads when praying (DiJoseph and Cavendish, 2005). However, healthcare professionals should first be aware of the personal beliefs of the patient with chronic illness or life threatening diseases before performing any of these symbolic activities in order to avoid making the patient and his/her family members feel disrespected (Koslander, de Silva and Roxberg, 2009; Leininger, 2002). Reasons Why Spirituality should be Incorporated in Holistic Care Spirituality is a phenomenon regarding the individuality and their connectedness to a higher being (DiJoseph and Cavendish, 2005). Considering that human beings are “biological-psychological-spiritual beings” (CiAP, 1995), nurses should see to it that they are able to incorporate the concept of holistic care with the spiritual needs to the patients. Despite knowing that human beings are spiritual beings, it is seldom that we can find healthcare professionals who are able to successfully incorporate the concept of spirituality with the provision of holistic care. Regardless of age and gender, most of the patients who are suffering from chronic illness and/or life-threatening diseases need special comfort and spiritual support coming from the healthcare professionals (Lundy and Janes, 2009, p. 995). One of the emotional comfort that the healthcare professionals could deliver is to uplift the patients’ spiritual distress. This is true especially in the case of patients who are receiving end-of-life care. By making the patient become spiritually balanced, it would be easier on the part of the healthcare professinals to provide them with less burden during the last few months or days to live. Similar to the positive emotional and psychological impact of integrating spirituality over the care for patients with life-threatening diseases, the application of this type of healthcare practices on patients with chronic illnesses could also develop a sense of hope and enthusiasm to be healed from the sickness. As a result, it is more likely for chronically ill patients to willingly accept and participate in the care and treatment rendered to them by the professional nurses. It is not advisable for nurses to consider the idea that spirituality is synonymous to religion. Although spirituality and religiousity are often considered as being synonymous, these two concepts are entirely not the same. Therefore, nurses should avoid trying to understand the meaning of spirituality in the point-of-view of religion. Instead, when trying to understand the real meaning of spirituality when applied in the practice of nursing, the healthcare professionals should focus more on using the concept of hope, relatedness/connectedness, and belief(s) (Dyson, Cobb and Forman, 2007). Conclusion and Recommendations The provision of holistic care is not limited to the administering of medication and/or assisting the patients with their activities of daily living. In order to be more effective when rendering care to patients who are chronically ill or is suffering from a life-threatening disease, it is essential for each nurse and other health care professional to be able to effectively apply the concept of spirituality when delivering care to the patients and their family. According to Nagai-Jacobson and Burkhardt (1989), the provision of holistic nursing “involve the spirituality of both the nurse and the patient and is transformational for both”. For this reason, healthcare professionals should learn how to become a good listener. Aside from considering the religious and cultural beliefs of each patient, it is equally important for healthcare professionals to speak to people who are close to the life of the patients (i.e. husband/wife, children, relatives, etc.). By doing so, healthcare professionals can effectively deliver holistic and spiritual care to the patients with or without chronic or life-threatening diseases. References Broker, C. and Nicol, M. (2003). Nursing Adults: The Practice of Caring. London: Elservier Ltd. CiAP (1995) Spirituality in nursing. [Online] Available at: http://www.ciap.health.nsw.gov.au/hospolic/stvincents/1995/a04.html [Accessed 15 June 2012]. Dunne, K., Sullivan, K. and Kernohan, G. (2005). Palliative care for patients with cancer: the district nurses' experiences. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 50(4), pp. 372-380. Dyson, J., Cobb, M. and Forman, D. (2007). The meaning of spirituality: a literature review. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 26(6), pp. 1183-1188. DiJoseph, J. and Cavendish, R. (2005). Expanding the Dialogue on Prayer Relevant to Holistic Care. Holistic Nursing Practice, 19(4), pp. 147-154. Hobson, L. and Noyes, J. (2011). Fatherhood and children with complex healthcare needs: qualitative study of fathering, caring and parenting. BMC Nursing, 10, p. 5. doi:10.1186/1472-6955-10-5. Jarrett, N., Payne, S. and Wiles, R. (1999). Terminally ill patients' and lay carers' perceptions and experiences of community-based services. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 29(2), pp. 476-483. Koslander, T., de Silva, A. and Roxberg, A. (2009). Existential and Spiritual Needs in Mental Health Care. An Ethical and Holistic Perspective. Journal of Holistic Nursing , 27(1), pp. 34-42. Leininger, M. (2002). Culture Care Theory: A Major Contribution to Advance Transcultural Nursing Knowledge and Practices. Journal of Transcultural Nursing, 13(3), pp. 189-192. Lundy, K. and Janes, S. (2009). Community Health Nursing: Caring for the Public's Health. MA: Jones and Bartlett Publishers. Major, D. (2003). Utilizing role theory to help employed parents cope with children’s chronic illness. Health Education Research, 18(1), pp. 45-57. Nagai-Jacobson, M. and Burkhardt, M. (1989). Spirituality: cornerstone of holistic nursing practice. DiJoseph J. and Cavendish R. (eds) "Expanding the Dialogue on Prayer Relevant to Holistic Care" Holistic Nursing Practice. 2005. 19(4), pp. 147-154. Patricia, S., Enes, D. and de Vries, K. (2004). A Survey of Ethical Issues Experienced by Nurses Caring for Terminally Ill Elderly People. Nursing Ethics, 11(2), pp. 150-164. Smart, C., Aslander-van Vliet, E. and Waldron, S. (2009). Nutritional management in children and adolescents with diabetes. Pediatric Diabetes, 10(Suppl. 12), pp. 100-117. Stannard, D. and Krenzischek, D. (2012). PeriAnesthesia Nursing Care. London: Jones & Bartlett Learning International. Wright, K. (2002). Caring for the terminally ill: the district nurse's perspective. British Journal of Nursing, 11(8), pp. 1180-1185. Yarbo, C., Wujcik, D. and Gobel, B. (2011). Cancer Nursing: Principles and Practice. London: Jones and Bartlett Publishers International. Read More