Patient Experiences & Expectations

Good afternoon readers!
I hope you are well (: I know i've been posting quite a lot but I want to make up for all the time that I was absent! Today I'll be talking about the expectations that patients will have of nurses and of their care and how we as health care professionals can improve the patients overall hospital/care experience! Enjoy!

Patient experiences and expectations
*Expect good standard of care from health care professionals
*Good communication between staff
*respect religious views i.e. same sex care
*Feel safe and be heard
*To be treated with respect and dignity

Health care professionals' expectations
*Correct resources to enable effective nursing
*To be treated with respect and acknowledgement
*Not be abused
*To be respected by other staff
*To be paid

Gaps between Health care professional and patients
*Shortage of staff
*Poor management or teamwork
*Lack of training, communication and experience
*Financial constraints
*Cultural differences
*Lack of equipment

Reducing gaps
*Improve staffing levels and education
*Educate patients
*Make patients more proactive in their care
*Reduce paperwork?
*Increase health promotion
*Increase awareness of risks of treatments
*Decrease use of jargon

Main focus of complaints
-Attitude of staff
-Communication failures
-Poor standards

Rights of patients
-To have complaint dealt with efficiently and properly investigated
-To be made ware of the outcomes of the investigation
-To take complaint to independent ombudsman if not completely satisfied
-To receive compensation if harmed
-Make a claim for judicial review if directly affected by unlawful act

How can health care professional engage effectively with patients to improve handling of complaints and improve quality of care delivery?
-Attend to complaint
-Listening and noting
-Checking needs regularly
-Knowledge and understanding
-Communicating
-Patient needs to be kept informed
-Try to resolve internally and not going to the media
-Know your boundaries as a student
-Understand patient expectations and get to know them when admitted
-Be open minded
-Support
-Explain complaint procedure
-Patient understands his/her right and responsibilities
-Have an awareness of advocacy services

Responding to complaints
-Apologise
-Ensure that it won’t happen again
-Decide how serious the issue is and how likely it is to reoccur
-What can be learnt?

Why feedback is important…
*Tells you what is working Helps you to identify the problems and risks and prevent them from worsening
*Highlight opportunities for staff development

Brief introduction to NICE
*An organisation set up in 1999
*Decides which new drugs and treatments should be available on the NHS (I'll probably discuss this is more detail in a later post so keep your eyes peeled!)

Above all...

Think about how your behaviour contributes to the patients overall experience

And that's it!!! I hope you have enjoyed this post! I'll try to post as much as possible. Time is very limited for me at the moment but I will do everything I can to give a weekly update AT LEAST!! (: Enjoy your day!

Emily

Introduction to Ethics & Moral Reasoning

Hi there! Today I'll be briefly talking about moral reasoning and ethics.

Why is Ethical and Moral Reasoning important in Nursing?
*Often faced with situations that involve moral and ethical issues andd concerns and dilemmas about what is the right thing to do.
*Caring for patients involves complex interactions and treatments
*Raises questions about whether we are going harm or good.

Comparison between Morals and Ethics

Morals
*Principles and rules of right conduct
*Private and personal
*Commitment to priciples and values usually defended in daily life

Ethics
*Professionally and publically stated
*Involves process of questioning and perhaps changing one's morals
*Inquiry and study of principles and values
*Formal responding process used to determine right conduct

Factors influencing Ethical decision making
*Law
*Social & cultural attitudes
*Media
*Politics
*Upbringing
*Education
*Experience

Ethical Principles
*Autonomy - Right to self-determination
*Beneficence - Duty to do good
*Non-maleficence - Duty to prevent harm
*Veracity - Truth telling
*Justice - Fairness and equality
*Paternalism - Allows someone to make a decision for another
*Fidelity - Duty to keep to ones promises and commitments
*Respect for others - Duty to treat others respectfully and without prejudice

Take a look at the video below:

Further Reading

Siviter, B. (2008) The Student Nurse Handbook, 2nd Edn. Bailliere Tindall.

Fant, C. (2011) Ethical Dilemmas in Nursing [Online]. Available at: http://www.nursetogether.com/Career/Career-Article/itemid/2520.aspx (Accessed: 6 June 2012).

NMC (2008) The code: Standards of conduct, performance and ethics for nurses and midwives. Nursing & Midwifery Council.

Well, I suppose this concludes a rather short but interesting topic! I'll be back later with more!! :D

Emily