Download Advocacy in Nursing: A Week 8 Reflection on Pediatrics and Women's Health and more Exams Nursing in PDF only on Docsity! NR 602 Week 8 Reflection Over the last several weeks, I have had the opportunity to expand my knowledge in regards to pediatrics and women’s health. I have learned many things throughout this class from my classmates, professor, and clinical preceptor. This course has allowed for me to meet MSN program outcome #6, MSN essential VII, and Nurse core competency #8. MSN Program Outcome #6: Apply legal, ethical and human-caring principals to situations in advanced nursing practice As an advanced nurse practitioner, it is important to still advocate for your patients no matter their age, but most importantly to advocate for patients who are young or old and unable to make specific healthcare decisions for themselves. Throughout this course, I was faced with two situations, which my patients needed to be advocated for. One included an elderly female who needed to be placed on blood pressure medication, however her care giver felt as if “she was fine” and did not need to be placed on any specific medications. At this point, the patient had had several blood pressure readings on different occasions with a systolic blood pressure greater than 160. The patient was conscious, alert, and oriented and could make decisions on her own, yet she was highly influenced by her caregiver. Due to the fact she was able to make decisions on her own she opted out of being placed on blood pressure medications, yet the risks of making this decision were described to her and she verbalized understanding. A second incident, I faced throughout this clinical rotation involved a pediatric patient who was being seen for arm pain, which occurred post fall. There was no obvious deformity, yet the patient had painful range of motion. The patient’s mother refused an x-ray, due to that we advocated for our patient and was forced to all child protective services due to possible neglect. In nursing, advocacy, has been defined as being a patient representative, defending the patient’s rights and universal rights, protecting the interests of the patient, contributing to decision-making and supporting the patient’s decisions (Abbaszadeh, Ahmadi, & Davoodvand, 2016). MSN Essential VII: Interprofessional Collaboration for Improving Patient and Population Health Outcomes As an advanced nurse practitioner, especially working in a family practice or primary care setting, it is important to help find or schedule follow ups with a specific specialist if needed. For example, throughout this rotation, I came in contact with two specific patient whom were diagnosed with breast cancer. As a healthcare team we specifically referred these patient to this specific surgeon (specializing with breast cancer), and she has issued the appropriate care and diagnostic procedures, however she has also continued to communicate with us in regards to results and continuation of care as her primary care providers. This is important because everyone involved in the patient’s care should all be on the same page and know everything going on with the patient. Things such as this will help to improve and provide the patient with appropriate care. This will also help to have positive outcomes in patient. Along with this, we as a team have called both patients on a weekly basis to make sure nothing is needed and they are following up with their appointments, and we check to see if they have any questions or concerns.
