Challenges and Responses to Improving Geriatric Nursing Care - Essay Example

CHALLENGES AND RESPONSES TO IMPROVING GERIATRIC NURSING CARE Life expectancy among various persons across the globe has been increasing due to improved eating habits. However, 80% of old people have chronic diseases like; diabetes, high blood pressure etc. This state calls for more attention to the old. Contrary to this, the number of the young people willing to train in gerontological nursing is still low; thus posing a challenge in maintaining sufficient work force to serve the old. Currently, there are few nurses, who have specialized in caring for the old. Therefore, there is not only shortage of nurses to deal with the old aged, but also poor services offered by practicing nurses. There is need for colleges to equip nursing students with skills to enable them perform optimally when serving the old. Incorporating practical sessions and internship will help a great deal in improving their knowledge. Experience gathered during internship provides one with a chance to practice handling the old age at an early age, and thus perform better latter at work. It is therefore necessary to understand the needs of the old aged, and how best to deal with them. From research, nurses who have interacted with the old people understand them better, communicate with them effectively and are able to attend to them comfortably and effectively. Discussion Nursing education and practice for the aged challenges The number of old-aged people seeking health care facilities is rising with no or minimal changes in the number of nurses specialized in the field. According to Hickman, University of Western Sydney and Newton (2007), most of the nurses attending to the old people have no special training. Therefore, apart from the shortage of nurses trained in dealing with the old, the already practicing nurses are offering substandard services to the old aged. This is because they lack professional competence in that area. Various reasons have contributed to reduced number of people training in gerontological studies, (Vincent, 2012). For instance, education institutions are faced with the challenge of handling large numbers of students. This leads to difficult in the institution offering the required facilities to the learners, hence leading to inadequate education. As such, nurses graduating from such institutions are not fully prepared to handle the elderly. Additionally, students find it difficult to pursue education program on care giving to the old age due to complexity of research projects undertaken in the field (Shellman, 2012). Moreover, studying gerontology is expensive, thus not affordable to some people. The nursing services for the old aged are quite costly making them unaffordable to a majority of the population. Due to health complication associated with old age, the elderly have frequent visits to health facilities; thus, take a quantitative amount of their income. Additionally, most of the health care institutions cannot afford quality facilities for providing high quality services to the elderly. University of Western Sydney and Halcomb (2007) suggests that huge costs are required to equip the institutions with the facilities. As such, due to monopoly, institutions that have such facilities transfer the cost to the clients in form of increased health care fees. The cultural norms influence nurses in learning and carrying out their daily assignments. For example, there is a belief that the old age is characterized with diseases and sicknesses. In actual sense, there are old people who are healthy and do not have frequent body complications. As such, given the required attention and care, they are able to perform normally. From a different perspective, the elderly have values that differ from those of the youths, due to age difference and experience (Fox, 2013). This differences lead to a challenge when a young nurse is dealing with an old aged person. The disparity result to conflict and discomfort, and consequently leads to ineffectiveness in service delivery. Cultural differences are present when people from different geographical origins interact in accomplishing a certain goal. The geographical differences creates disparity in language commonality; hence, communication barrier. As such, the nurse is not in a position to understand the client’s communication, which may result to provision of substandard services. Responses to the challenges facing the nursing education and practice for the old age care giving. Given the state of the population growth, it is inevitable to have nurses who are professionally trained in old age health care, (Harvath, Beck, Flaherty-Robb, Hartz, Specht, Sullivan-Marx & Archbold, 2006). The percentage of professionals trained in this field should match the requirements in order to provide high quality services. This is achieved through addressing challenges experienced both in the education sector as well in the workplace. In nurturing future nursing professionals, all the nursing students should be trained on how to deal with the old aged persons. The general knowledge of the behavior of the old aged will enable the nurse deal with old aged patients effectively. In educational institutions, despite the lack of enough facilities, creativity and innovation can help a great deal in overcoming some challenges; it is possible to come up with affordable models, which will facilitate learning. These teaching models reduce the need for intensive research while at the same time expose the students to the required skills. The models reduce the research cost and time, which keeps away most of the students. Additionally, educational institutions should work closely with the health care institutions that can offer placement opportunities to the students while undertaking the program as well as immediately after graduation. Through these approaches, students will have the right skills about the applicability of their course in the practical world, which will facilitate improvement of health care provision. While in college, students should be exposed to intensive research practices. This can be facilitated through, provision of the required research materials, guidance and motivation. Through research, researchers can come up with more cost effective methods of care giving, (Fox, 2013). Recommendations given after the research can be used to implement new procedures that can be effective and available to a majority of the population, irrespective of their geographical location. The modern health care equipment can be invented and verified via scientific investigations. The major advantage of exposing nursing students to research, while in college is that, it will become part of their practice even in the work place, which will make them creative and innovative. This way, nursing students meet the provisions of the course. Apart from the increase in the number of the old aged population, healthcare provision to the elderly is becoming complex. Therefore, there is the need to have creative workmanship that will assist in effectively responding to the daily challenges. Some students have no interest in studying gerontology. Such an attitude can be attributed to the cultural norms and believes (Vincent, 2012). Everyone has a culture and norms, which may affect him/her either positively or negatively in the achievement of the set goals and objectives. In most cases, training nurses do interact with the old, which is often not appealing to them; the students tend to be dissatisfied with handling the elderly. This negative attitude affects them negatively in rendering their services. The aged originate from various places, which guarantee that they hold diverse cultural values and beliefs. This can attribute to low student enrolment in old age care courses. Understanding the interrelationship between different stakeholders in the health care industry is necessary to continuously improve services rendered. Therefore, students should be trained and exposed to diverse cultures. The exposure and knowledge will help them overcome the fear of dealing with people of different age group and originality. The care giving homes should co-work with agencies that can facilitate the settlement of bills; for instance, social security, Medical care, and long-term care insurances. These bodies enable people to save money while working (Shellman, 2012). There should also be clear procedures to be used to assess how much a person should pay for the health care services. The assessment and conclusion on the service fee to be charged to a client should be in line with the local and regional factors. In the past, a majority of the elderly have not been able to access health care facilities because of low family income and ignorance. With the awareness on the merits of saving for old age, many individuals will be able to access health facilities regardless of their family income. The colleges and universities should focus on providing education programs that will equip nursing students with skills for dealing with the old people. In the work environment, it has been observed that a nurse cannot stay away from attending to the old age even if he is not working in a nursing home for the old people (Fox, 2013). It is within this line that the nurses should acquire specific education on dealing with the old people. The aged requires the nurse’s and family members’ input. Through this understanding, a nurse will be able to establish a good communication link with the family of the client. The nurse requires the skills to inquire relevant information about the old person (Harvath, Beck, Flaherty-Robb, Hartz, Specht, Sullivan-Marx & Archbold, 2006). A good link between the old person, family and nurse, will enable the nurse to monitor the health progress of the old person even when he is at home. A nurse attending to other patients can attend to the elderly instead of employing specialists. The nurses will therefore be retained for longer, which increases their effectiveness in the services offered; efficiency is directly proportional to experience. Therefore, clients feel satisfied when being served by an individual they are familiar with. Conclusion Given that the number of the elderly is going to increase drastically in the future, there is increased demand for trained and professionally qualified. It is therefore, important for concerned bodies to sensitize and encourage nursing students to take gerontological studies with seriousness. In addition, the health agencies should support education institutions offering programs on health care for the elderly. Through this, it will be possible to match the supply for nurses trained in old age health with the increasing demand. The old aged will be able to access high quality services; hence, remain resourceful even in their old age because of good health. Through research, creativity and innovation, the health facilities for the old aged will be improved and available even in the remote areas. The practicing environment for the nurses will be well-equipped; hence, good services will be rendered to the clients. Finally, the nurses will be in a position to handle the complexities of dealing with the aged. References Fox, J. R. (January 01, 2013). Educational strategies to promote professional nursing in long- term care. An integrative review. Journal of Gerontological Nursing, 39, 1, 52-60. Harvath, T. A., Beck, C., Flaherty-Robb, M., Hartz, C. H., Specht, J., Sullivan-Marx, E., & Archbold, P. (July 01, 2006). Best practice initiatives in geriatric nursing: Experiences from the John A. Hartford Foundation Centers of Geriatric Nursing Excellence. Nursing Outlook, 54, 4, 212-218. Hickman, Louise, University of Western Sydney, Newton, Phillip J., University of Western Sydney, Halcomb, Elizabeth, University of Western Sydney, Chang, Esther, ... School of Nursing. (2007). Best practice interventions to improve the management of older people in acute care settings: a literature review. U.K. Blackwell Scientific. Shellman, J. (January 01, 2012). Engaging students in gerontological research. Journal of Gerontological Nursing, 38, 9, 13-7. Vincent, J. L. (2012). Annual update in intensive care and emergency medicine 2012. Berlin: Springer. Read More