Symptom Assessment and Management Plan - Essay Example

? Symptom Assessment and Management Plan Symptom Assessment and Management Plan Management of symptoms considers broader and wider forms of evidences to be effective. The controlled trials, which are randomized, do well in giving the required evidences of symptoms, which can easily lead to proper health of symptom management. Symptom assessments may be different in many ways even if there were having the same effects because of many factors though in their management, the stages of infections and the wishes of the patients must be taken into consideration. This is because in considering the symptoms in a patient, there are various practices, which may not be culturally acceptable, such issues are majorly known if the patient reveals to the medical practitioner. Symptom management plan which is comprehensive involves a number of considerations. These are: An in-depth and holistic assessment Based on the assessment, there should be identification of the probable based on the assessment The execution of the intervention The continuous evaluation of the measures of intervention Effective management requires various things. These include: i. Amalgamated approach: this involves symptom assessment which is multidimensional. For instance, in the case of the management of pain, may require both patient education on how effectiveness of relation, and opioid. This is helpful as it teaches the patient the method of relieving oneself from anxiety. ii. The specific and targeted approach: this is directed to find out the exact factors contributing to the problem of a specified problem. For instance, pharmaceutical agents could be required to investigate various causal factors to a specific disease or ailment. iii. A tailored approach: this method is suited for some circumstance. For example, a patient who does not have caregivers or adequate financial capabilities may have to get support from other caregivers. Evaluation It is very vital for one to investigate and find out the level of the underlying symptoms and to determine the progress of the disease. This is important as it helps in determining whether the disease can be reversed or if one is advancing to the terminal stage of their illness. The investigation may be done purposefully to: alleviate the root cause of a symptom and deliver one from the effects of the symptom. Patient Issues related to Symptom assessment and management plan There are various issues with different patients, which may affect the assessment. There this paper presents an elaboration of literature review, which singles out the interconnection of of areas focus in relation to the pain one is undergoing. These include communication, the spiritual life of a patient, and their relationships. Relationships and Communications Health practitioners and hospitals should conduct and facilitate individual patient support to empower patients to talk effectively health professionals any other person. In addition to this, heal professionals should be trained adequately to enable them to learn the dynamics of communicating to patients, their informal caregivers and how they can communicate with other professionals. The major issue of concern that has been of concern all along is the importance of communication among and between various groups of persons involved. For instance, patients, health care professionals and the informal caregivers. For the case of patience, good communication, trust, and planning are the major concepts in the control of major symptoms that may have been found to develop in a patient. Patients should constantly be assured of wellness not sufferance and disaster after the treatment. The patients should be told of the side effects that are related to some diseases and treatments. The fear that may engulf a patient about a specific treatment like cancer should be attended to and well addressed. The type of relationship that exists between a patient and health professionals matters a lot in the health improvement of a patient. The type of relationship between them determines how the patient improves with the therapy and better adjustment to the diagnosis given. The informal care givers are also in a better position of assessing the progress of patients, though for this to be effective, they must also be in good communication with the clinician. The clinicians should be aware of the pain and the strain informal care givers undergo with patients who are suffering and those that are in pain. It is important for medical practitioners, clinicians, and nurses to understand the family of the patient well. This knowledge and understanding of the patients’ family enables the support to provide an enabling environment for the family and the patient to voice their fears without fear but with confidence. Active listening occurs when the patient perceives that the communication is all-inclusive. This is achieved when the healthcare providers communicate to the level of the patient with a language independent of jargons. The communication has to be non-patronizing as much as possible so as not to raise the skepticism of the patient. Communication between the patient and the clinician has just to be prober and with maximum understanding since poor communication may result to misinterpretation of some things on the side of the patient and the clinician may write a poor report, which is not a reflection of the probable disease behind the symptoms. The assessment and the probable management of a symptom and the pain caused by the disease should be left open to the patient at all costs. It is also of great value and importance for the clinicians to create an enabling environment for the patient to talk about their illnesses, as this would help them to normalize their situation. This is best done when the health practitioners train them to take dairies of their daily progress and creating a forum where these people can talk freely. This is important as it helps in enabling the patient to monitor their conditions and share their experiences with other people. Another patient issue that healthcare providers should be much concerned and aware of is the patients’ spirituality. It is important for health care professionals to be educated of the social and psychological dimensions of the patients they are dealing with. Since the healthcare providers handle many people across multicultural and religious dimensions, it is important that they get educated of various beliefs that are held across different cultures and religions but most specifically for the belief systems of the patient, they are dealing with. There are evidences that shows that other than the conventional treatment and counseling, the spiritual belief of a patient enables them to come to terms with the pains of their sufferance and accept the reality. It is also important because patients’ spiritual and religious faith enable them to cope and live with the hope of getting well. This hope is important for the psychological healings. The spiritual and psychological awareness is important since they enable an individual to get sense of meaning to life. These meaning enables one to know how to handle aggression and life challenging instances, and invasive treatments. Most of the diseases that attack human persons give pain greater than the physical pains. The spiritual aspect of the patient helps one to cope with the situation of their pain. Therefore, it is important for the professional medical practitioners to adopt a holistic approach of dealing with the patients since patients are dynamic and very diverse. This is important because it has been proven that most patients value health professionals who are diverse in their approaches to dealing with patience. Such professionals minimize their chances of going against the belief system of an individual patient. Diverse thinking and approaches also enables the practitioner to be sensitive to the environment of the patients’ origin. This enables one to come above the confines of their own worldview and offer assistance based on the value systems of the subject who is the patient. Additionally, an understanding of a patient’s background and the family structure would also determine the effectiveness of the intervention measure. This is so because when the clinician or the support adopts a measure that conflicts with that of the community where a patient ails from, the measures of intervention may not be well accepted. What led to the assessment? There are various diseases that affects people whose symptoms could be detected at an early stage to offer the appropriate interventions yet they are seriously ignored. Looking at the symptoms and analyzing them does a great good to the patient who are infected and everybody that is infected by some of these maladies. It is also pushing to find out the reason as to why people would develop symptoms and not handle them appropriately before the full blond stage of a disease. This assessment is purposefully meant to find out how healthcare providers can cope with various symptoms to help the patient to go through the healing process. It worth noting that, in the course of helping the patients, there are various things that must be considered and put in place to ensure that patients are taken care of without a feeling of grievance. Patients are from diverse origin with different beliefs; in connection to this, the assessment is meant to give a description of the situation that can directly affect the interventions that are put in place to help the patient. Additionally, the motive behind the assessment is to bring to light the impact and the influence patients’ families have how effective an intervention measure can be during the medical intervention. The assessment recognizes that the patients’ families are a significant factor in determining the response of a patient to the measures of interventions administered. It is also of much interest to evaluate most of the patient issues that can affect the outcome or the response of the measure of the interventions needed. Among them are the spiritual and the cultural aspects of a patient. Most notably, cultural background of a patient has a strong influence in the life of a person that anything practice that goes against their preset beliefs are considered to be malpractices are not acceptable in the life of a patient. Anything measure of intervention that does not respect the religious or the spiritual aspect of a patient is always not effective. The assessments take into account various roles of the medical professionals in dealing with the situation of patients, and interpretation the symptoms developed by the patients are given. Discuss how the tools were completed The symptom assessment tool was completed by the verification and use of the Assessment Acronym tool, which is a tool that aid in the assessment approach. The acronym assessment tool is important in determining the symptoms and interpreting the root cause of various conditions that befall patients. The tools were completed using the assessment acronym O, P, Q, R, S, T, U and V The assessment determines the onset of the disease; it seeks to answer the question as to the time the ailment began. The formula also takes an inventory of the long the condition has taken. The assessment also looks at the regularity of the assessment. The assessment also ask the provocative questions as to what causes the condition, it further investigates what worsens the condition and what makes it better. This assessment gives one clue on how to start handling the situation that is currently at hand. The assessment seeks to determine the quality of the infection. It seeks to determine the intensity with which the condition occurs. It then seeks to determine whether the patient is in a position of describing what they feel. The assessment also goes to the specific, it determines the location of the body that is affected, and how it affects other parts of the body. This measure is important because by it it would be very easy to know how to start in carrying out the measure of intervention. The assessment then seeks to determine the severity of the symptom. The assessment seeks to determine the intensity with which the infection affects the patient. This is done by the use of scale marked one to ten where ten is the most severe state of pain while zero indicates that there is no effect of the same. It also seeks to determine the how far the patient gets bothered of the situation that they find themselves in. it is a natural thing that the patients could get bothered of their situation (Ferrell, & Coyle, 2006). Knowing this could help one to know on how to carry out the counseling interventions. Taking the medical history of the patient is also of great significance, this model does it by enquiring from the patient whether they are undergoing any medication at the present or if they have been undergoing a specific medication. The assessment also finds out how the treatment is effective and whether they have been of any help to the patient. It then finds out if there is an effect, the medication has on the patient both negative and positive. This section then does the enquiry of other medications that the patient has been on in the past. The assessment is also done on the take of the patient on the symptoms under view. It seeks to get the patients opinion on what they believe could be the root cause of the problem that they are undergoing. From the patients’ perspective, the assessment seeks to determine how the patients’ family reacts to the disease of the patient and how the same affect them. The assessment then concludes by looking at the values of the patient in relation to the symptoms that they have. It is vital to find out the patients’ goals with the disease that is affecting them, how hopeful they are and the level of their acceptance of the disease. The assessment seeks to determine the views, and feelings of the assessment. Skills you used, The skills used to collect the data ranged across many research methods. First, the necessary skills that helped in carrying out the inquiries were those that required one to know how to administer the questionnaire to questions, which seemed too personal that that the patients could not open up to tell the researcher. It is also critical to know how to carry out interviews. This reacquires one to be people conscious and people intelligent to avoid any question that could offend the patient. This demands that one must know the dynamics of the society. One must also be equipped with keenness of observation to draw accurate conclusion based on one’s observation. To find answers to the assessment questions, the researcher applied open-ended questions that allowed the patients and the participants to give out clear answers that are elaborate. The researcher also asked probing questions that provokes the memory of the patients to recall how they have passed through the symptoms. This helps one to get the history of the symptoms under investigation and the treatments that they have been undergoing. Management of the patients and other personnel to be involved The researcher participants must be treated with respect at all times. History involving human beings reveal that in the past there are researchers who have treated the participants as means towards an end. This is improper and unethical because it diminishes the value of a human being (Olumoroti, & Kassim, 2005). The research should also protect the rights of the people considered to the vulnerable. The researcher must also be ready to compensate the participants for any damage that may have been caused. It is also important note that, the researcher must inform the participants of the expected damages and the side effects that may be experienced with the study. In endeavoring to do the study and to get the information, one should keep the information confidential. Literature Review Various authorities have studied the guide to patient issues and symptom issues. These authorities include the academia’s, researcher, and health practitioners. Lippincott, a researcher did a survey and come up with a flow chart, which determines how one can be, evaluated depending on the severity of the diseases or the symptom Fitzgibbon, D. R., & Loeser, 2010). The flow that expressed by Lippincott and Wilkins give a clear model through which the interviews and the medical condition and history of the patient is. Kamphaus gives the psychological and overall model through which the study gains its success. The nursing health assessment also does a great good in determining how to conduct the study, which links to the patients’ symptom assessment Lippincott (William & Technologies, 2004). In addition, patients’ management models must be adhered to at all times. All patients must be treated with dignity and not as mere objects of experiment. Chambers and brown argue that patients must be given their freedom and the will to share with others their experience. References Lippincott Williams & Wilkins., & Ovid Technologies, Inc. (2004). Rapid assessment: A flowchart guide to evaluating signs and symptoms. Springhouse: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. Kamphaus, R. W., & Campbell, J. M. (2006). Psychodiagnostic assessment of children: Dimensional and categorical approaches. Hoboken, N.J: John Wiley & Sons. Dillon, P. M. (2007). Nursing Health Assessment. Philadelphia: F. A. Davis Company. Paulman, P. M. (2012). Signs and symptoms in family medicine: A literature-based approach. Philadelphia, PA: Elsevier/Mosby. Fitzgibbon, D. R., & Loeser, J. D. (2010). Cancer pain: Assessment, diagnosis, and management. Philadelphia: Wolters Kluwer Health/Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. Chambers, E. J., Germain, M., & Brown, E. A. (2010). Supportive care for the renal patient. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Olumoroti, O. J., & Kassim, A. A. (2005). Patient management problems in psychiatry. Edinburgh: Elsevier Churchill Livingstone. Ferrell, B., & Coyle, N. (2006). Textbook of palliative nursing. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Read More