Advanced Health Assessment
Assessment is one of the first steps in becoming a nurse. From the time we enter nursing school we are taught to assess. Whether we are formulating a nursing care plan or rendering bedside care to a patient, assessment skills are, in my opinion, one of the most important foundation skills to master in the profession of nursing.
“Assessment is the collection of data about an individual’s health state (Jarvis, 2008)”. This statement seems so simple, but in reality what I learned during the course of the semester was that assessment is not limited to just the physical being, but also includes culture, values, family and support networks, as well as the ability of the patient to care for self.NURS 6512 Week 5 Essay Assignment These factors must be assessed in order to follow a holistic model of care (Jarvis, 2008).
Although this task seemed insurmountable initially, I realized that the way in which I typically assess patients could provide a more holistic approach by integrating some of the techniques I learned in this class. I normally have conversations with my patients while I assess them, and I found that if I asked them about their lives as I went about the physical aspect of the exam, I could learn much about how they were feeling and what support systems they had available to them