Middle range or grand theory - Essay Example

MIDDLE RANGE OR GRAND THEORY Vicky Brown School: UCLA Middle range or grand theory The area of specialty of the is in psychiatricnursing. This is an area of practice which involves giving care and treatment to patients with different forms of mental health conditions (Good, 2008). Even though it will not be admitted that patients with mental health conditions have mental incompetency, it cannot be denied that these people are hardly independent in the performance of daily tasks and roles. In the light of this, nurses in this area of care are often faced with the need to commit and dedicate so much of their time to the delivery of care to patients.

As a result of this, a situation referred to as self-care deficit results for patients receiving care. Self-care deficit has been explained as a situation where a patient is unable to meet their self-care requites (Register and Herman, 2006). As explained already this situation occurs because of the amount of time that care givers give to mental health patients, denying patients the need to give themselves care. Meanwhile, Dorothea Orem developed and introduced the self-care deficit nursing theory as a form of middle range nursing theory to help nurses tackle such situations as described above (Good, 2008).

Because self-care deficit nursing theory is a form of middle range nursing theory, it would be said that middle range theory will be most applicable to the author’s area of nursing practice. In the application of middle range theory however, there are a number of assumptions that are used to underpin the implementation of the theory. The central philosophy or assumption based on which the theory works is that all patients wish to care for themselves (Register and Herman, 2006). This means that patients are presented with better opportunities of recovery if they are allowed to perform their own self-care.

Based on this assumption, it is expected that instead of psychiatric nurses doing everything for patients, they should make room for patients to try their hands on basic tasks. This can help in making the whole healthcare process patient-centered. ReferencesGood M. A. (2008). Middle-range theory of acute pain management: use in research. Nursing Outlook. 46(3):120-124. Register M.E. and Herman J. (2006). A middle range theory for generative quality of life for the elderly. Advanced Nursing Science. 29(4):340-350.